PoHA Poleepkwa Help Association
by Poleepkwana
Summary: Ana did not come to Johannesburg to be near the aliens. In fact, she was hoping not to see one closer than was necessary, like outside the TV, for example. But a few events will not only surpass her expectations but also transform her completely.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1 – Where is the love**

"Hey, lookit that!"

Keith signaled towards a dark, shifting figure half concealed behind a container. It was almost nightfall in the city of Johannesburg and the group of hulky friends and their girlfriends was walking down a deserted street from the cinema, celebrating their first week in the city, when the biggest and blondest of them noticed the lonely scavenger amidst the shadows.

The prawn hadn't noticed them, busy as it was rummaging through the garbage for something to eat, or something to sell. Ana grabbed hold of Keith's humongous quarterback arm begging him to just ignore the critter. She had recently moved to Johannesburg, but not because of them. They scared her, she wanted nothing to do with their kind.

"Don't go near it, Keith, let's just go."

"Hang on, baby, I wanna check it out."

Half the members of the group seemed as thrilled with the idea as him and followed Keith. Gery and her boyfriend Sean, two good friends of Ana, stayed behind with her and watched, and they all thought they knew what to expect when Keith showed such interest in something. It usually meant someone was about to have a rough time.

"Keith!" Ana insisted without much hope. He had the habit of getting them all in trouble. Sometimes she wondered why she still went out with him, why she had followed him all the way to Johannesburg.

Keith and his three brawny friends stepped up to the prawn, who had just that instant noticed the humans approaching and stood facing them, its eyes alert and nervous, its hands at the ready for anything they might attempt. It was wearing some sort of long skirt which made a somewhat awkward effect over its grasshopper legs.

Ana had only seen them through a TV screen up until then and hadn't expected to find a real-life one on the street on her first week there. She was really hoping not to.

"Hey, buddy" Keith said to the prawn, "look, I got something you may like here."

He held out his closed fist and the rest chuckled silently. The prawn looked at it with distrust and started slowly backing up as the humans came closer.

"Go on, take a look, I'll trade you for something."

The alien took one last look at the fist and decided that whatever it was, it was definitely not worth the risk and quickly turned to leave. That's when Keith and his three friends jumped on it and threw it on the ground, immobilizing it like only four football players could.

Ana cringed seeing the prawn squeal and growl in fear as the four young men held it against the concrete. Keith was now holding his cell phone up in front of the enraged creature, apparently recording the whole thing. He smiled with delight while scanning the prawn's entire carcass with the phone's light.

"Hey, baby! Come look at this, it's so weird!"

She took a few hesitant steps forward.

"Keith, just leave it alone and let's go."

"Look at how it breathes, it's crazy!" he exclaimed holding the phone's light to the prawn's heaving throat. "Come here, look at this!"

Ana couldn't see anything from there, and neither did she want to. It had never occurred to her that the aliens could be creatures she could feel compassion for, but the scene was getting on her nerves.

"You're being an ass. Let it go!"

"We're just curious. Have you even seen one this up close before!"

One of the boys, a square-headed, dark-skinned bloke whose name she didn't even remember, touched one of the prawn's twitching antenna and quickly removed his hand when the prawn reacted with a flinch and a growl. All of them laughed.

"I think they're sensitive or something, man" he guffawed.

"Leave it alone, you're all drunk!" screamed Ana.

"Well so are you" answered one of the boys' girlfriend, who had been observing the inspection closely all the time. Ana always hated her slutty ass.

"I'm not harassing some poor creature just out of curiosity!"

"Ana, it's a _prawn_."

"Come on, he's done nothing to you!" Gery joined on Ana's side.

Keith merely ignored them.

"We're not hurting it, God!"

But in Ana's opinion, he had just gone too far the moment he pulled up the shaggy fabric the alien was wearing and uncovered its pelvis. The prawn screeched and writhed in misery.

"Keith, no!"

"Hey don't do that, man!" Sean protested as well.

The boys holding the prawn laughed at the naked pelvis.

"Man, just lookit that! That is the weirdest thing I've seen!" said Keith as he picked up a stick from the ground and brushed it against the prawn's groin.

"Stop this, it's sick!"

"We're not doing anything to it, baby" he said still not taking his eyes off the prawn's pelvis. Everyone present except for Ana and Gary and Sean was watching with morbid fascination. The prawn trembled in despair and Ana watched with revulsion.

And their eyes met.

There was so much terror, so much sadness in its eyes that Ana reacted on an impulse by grabbing her boyfriend's arm and pulling to make him stand.

"You and I are _finished_ from this moment on, Keith" she growled. "You-are-an-_ass_!"

Keith looked bewildered.

"It's just a fucking _prawn_!"

"You're a lot worse than them!"

"How can I be worse than them?"

"Tell them to let that prawn go, Keith!"

They both exchanged outraged looks for a moment and then Keith turned around and kept recording the prawn's face while the slut gave Ana a haughty look. God, how she hated her.

Gery and Sean walked up to her and they both turned to leave, figuring they really could do nothing for the prawn, but then they saw a group of several people that were marching up the street towards them looking unfriendly. And was that another prawn marching behind them?

"Keith, people are coming" she warned.

"No one even cares about this, baby" he laughed but was cut off by a couple of hands that dragged him off his knees to a standing position.

"Lay off the prawn!" said one of the strangers. He was tall and had the presence of a school principal, enough to make Keith back off a couple steps before he managed to react.

"Who the hell are you?"

Another six of them joined in and Keith didn't look so brave anymore. Especially after realizing one of the strangers was another healthier-looking, menacingly confident prawn.

"I said lay off the prawn!"

The other three immediately let go of the prawn's arms and legs and stood aside when it jumped to its feet and made to snap at them before running to put some distance between itself and the humans. The other prawn skipped towards it, grabbing its arm to keep it from running away and they both started chattering something excitedly, but Ana was too distracted by the present scene to take much notice.

"Sympathizers!" yelled Keith like it was the worst insult he could think of. It certainly was the longest word he had said in a long time.

"Just get outta here" the strangers said like they were shooing off some pesky swarm of flies.

"Sympathizers!" he repeated and the rest echoed. Ana didn't know what to do. Going with them was the last thing on her mind, and so was it on Gery and her boyfriend's mind, apparently.

"Go on, scram" said the tall stranger non-challantly.

Keith took one last furious look at Ana before understanding she wasn't coming with them and then walked away ignoring her completely.

"Hey!"

Ana gave a start. The tall stranger had walked up to them accompanied by a few of his friends. He was at least several years older than them, pale and dark-haired.

"Are you with them?" he asked pointing at the group of bullies.

"No" Sean said for the three of them. "At least not anymore."

"Did you have anything to do with this?"

The stranger was calmly talking to Ana this time, so she just had to answer.

"No. Well, one of them was my boyfriend, but I just dumped him, so…" she added quickly.

"We were actually trying to make them stop."

The stranger looked behind himself at the group of people, and so did Ana. The prawn that had moments before been lying in the ground stood before several of the humans looking anxious, shaking from head to toes and keeping close to the other prawn who was calmly speaking to it. There seemed to be some sort of introduction going on. The tall stranger turned his eyes back to them.

"All right" he said and turned to leave. "Night, then."

That left Ana, Gery and Sean looking awkwardly at each other.

"So what do we do now?" asked Gery. "Our place is only a few blocks away, but how are you gonna get home?"

"It's ok, I'll find a taxi. Really, no problem" she smiled at them, wanting them to feel alright with it. Secretly she just wanted them to leave so she could maybe stay for a couple more minutes and watch.

She succeeded and the couple set off in the opposite direction.

Ana then pretended to be distracted with her cell phone. She wasn't sure what kept her here. Was it the prawns she was starting to get interested in? Or was it that tall, dark-haired, self contained, generally good-looking stranger?

A short while later the reunion started to break up and Ana headed for a main street to get the taxi she had mentioned earlier intentionally walking past the group and focusing particularly on the two prawns. It felt strange, but if all those people didn't care, then why should she worry about them? The smaller prawn was looking a bit less terrified now, as far as Ana could see through the veil of the interspecies barrier, around its new company.

"Everything alright?"

It was the tall stranger again. He probably noticed her attempt to get a closer look. But he didn't seem angry, on the contrary. He came closer and dedicated her a smile. He had a great smile.

"You look like you need a ride."

Ana hesitated.

"Uh, well… I am pretty far from my house, but don't worry, I don't want to interrupt…"

The stranger gently shook his head.

"Nothing to interrupt. We were just leaving. Almost nine, see? Their curfew's almost starting" he added pointing towards the prawns. "Need to get them back to D9."

"Oh… Well, thank you, but I…"

"Ah, I know what you're thinking. Don't worry, my car's over there and the prawns aren't coming. I was going to drop off a couple friends anyway. If you come with us we'll tell you whatever you're so curious about."

Ana gave a doubtful snigger.

"Uh, well… fine, ok."

The stranger nodded in agreement.

"Come, I'll introduce you."

Ana thanked the heavens that most of the people had already gone, including the prawns. All that was left was a couple of people besides them two, and suddenly she noticed they really weren't all boys. There was a girl: a very tall girl, dressed in gothic style. She stared at her baggy black pants covered with hanging silver chains for an instant before realizing she was actually being rather rude. Still, no wonder Ana had taken her for another boy.

"This is Amelia and Thomas. My name is Rineke" they all held hands.

"Ana" she said.

At least she didn't need to pay for a taxi, though she felt like an outsider the whole way home. These people were… Well, they socialized with prawns, for one thing. Not only that; they told her about their "association"; their Poleepkwa Help Association.

"What help?"

"Poleepkwa is what they call themselves. The prawns. We try not to use the word prawn unless it's necessary. It's derogatory."

"We were patrolling" added Thomas matter-of-factly. He had a foreign accent. "We do that sometimes. There's always someone to help, sadly…"

Ana thought "sad" wasn't the word she would use to describe Thomas's mood. He seemed to be enjoying the whole thing the most.

"Thomas is from Scotland" Rineke commented. "He's come all the way here for some time to help around."

"Aye, I've been saving for this since high school" he said joyfully.

"You want a tip?" said the goth girl. "If you find yourself face to face with a Poleepkwa, do the Clingon sign, you know" and she demonstrated, holding her hand up with the fingers in such a position that she could fit them in a three fingered glove. "It's our secret greeting. If you're lucky they'll know what you mean."

"Hah, ok…" chuckled Ana.

" We can't tell you much about us yet, but maybe you'd like to join us for one of our meetings!"

"Um, right."

"You can meet other Poleepkwas. It'll be interesting, eh?" said Amelia.

Whatever, she thought. All she knew was she didn't feel like having an encounter like that ever again.

"Look, I'll give you my number. If you wanna give me yours I can call you when we're having a meeting" Rineke said. He didn't even wait for a reply. He wrote his number down on a piece of paper and handed it to her. The car stopped; she was home. "You don't have to give me your number now, just call me and I'll get it."

"Ok. See ya and thanks so much for the ride."

"Bye, Ana."

"Nice meeting you."

"Awaiting your call!"

Ana swung the car door shut and headed for the front door without looking back, feeling glad that was over.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2 – You know what they do to guys like me in prison**

After three weeks, she was already feeling sorry that she ever came to study in this city, although not at all for having dumped Keith. She actually wondered why she hadn't done it before. Sure, she missed some of the affection and, well, the other stuff, but clearly it had never been worth it. Besides, she had other things on her mind now.

She never called Rineke. She had thought about it. He was handsome. He seemed intelligent. Maybe he liked her. But then she always remembered the kind of company he kept and gave up dreaming. College was as pointless as ever. She didn't even like what she was studying! But her parents had paid for this year, so no point letting it go to waste…

So she attended her classes, kept turning in assignments and day by day tolerated her roommate's habit of leaving her dirty laundry wherever it dropped. She liked her, of course, but they barely saw each other anyway but for breakfast sometimes. Syrup was her name –or at least that's what she said –, and she worked late at night, so by the time she came home to sleep, Ana was already on her way out.

She worked in the morning and then went to class in the afternoons, and then walked back home because it was the only time of day she could do it: when the prawns were all back in their homes in District 9. God, how she missed her old prawn-less city.

Not that she couldn't walk on the same street than a prawn, she just didn't want to. It was much better making sure that by that time she was out, all the prawns were definitely gone. There weren't even any cars on that road at that hour, which was also great, since the sidewalks in that neighborhood were so uncared for; not the most desirable area of the city, what with its proximity to a non-human area, but it was cheap. The cheapest she could find, in fact, and that was always a requirement.

She had come to work and study to Joburg for her friends, because they had all come to get a life here. She had come to be near Keith as well. Now she felt like an idiot, a lonely idiot in a big city with nothing to do, surrounded by aliens, of which she was terrified.

"Fuck!"

And atop all that, she almost fell flat on her face when her boots slipped on something.

"What the hell!" she protested angrily and bent over to take a look at the gooey substance under the dim light of the streetlamp.

She was no expert, but anyone could've guessed the nature of that red, sticky fluid: blood.

There was enough blood in the road to paint her entire bedroom, and a trail leading away from it told her the former owner of the blood had probably crept towards that corner of the street there.

She froze.

Whoever or whatever it was, it was still crawling creepily in the direction that her house was. It was a block away, and it was dark, so she couldn't tell if it was a person or an animal. One part of her told her to please stay away and turn around and find a longer way home. Another part thought it was probably her duty to help the poor thing.

And a third part was just curious.

So her cautious part was outmatched and Ana kept walking silently towards the corner, shielding herself with her backpack. She could already hear the harsh breathing of the victim, raspy and wheezy, but didn't stop.

Until she made out the victim's nature.

A prawn was sitting in the middle of the street, complaining and purring, grabbing its leg with its two hands. Apparently it had given up trying to move any further. It was far enough that it hadn't noticed her yet, but close enough for her to distinguish the twitching antennae.

In an almost reflexive reaction , Ana took out her cell phone and looked for the one number she could think of at the moment and, strangely enough, it wasn't MNU's emergency number.

The phone dialed and Ana tip-toed behind a streetlight waiting for an answer.

"Hello?"

"Um, hi, this is Ana, remember? From the other night?" she breathed.

"Hey, what's up!" Rineke sounded pleasantly surprised, though there was quite a bit of noise in the background.

"Yeah, uh… there-is-a-prawn, like, one block away from me…"

Some laughing in the background and then "why?"

"Why? I don't know, do I! I'm asking _you_! What's a goddamn prawn doing here!"

There was a rumble, then a sound of closing doors and the background noise faded.

"Where are you?" he said later.

"I'm in, uh, Covington Road. I mean, it's not D9 or anything!"

"What's he doing?"

"It's just sitting there, I think it's badly injured… Oh, God, I think he just saw me!"

The prawn had raised its head in alarm.

"Ok, calm down, Ana…"

"Oh, crap, he's looking at me!"

"It's ok, he's probably more scared of you than you of him."

"I doubt that very much" she giggled.

"You say he's injured."

"Yeah."

"Get closer."

"Get closer?"

"Yeah, show yourself to him. Do you remember the sign?"

"Uh, yeah…"

"Well, show him!"

Ana grimaced at the thought, but did as she was told. She stepped out from behind the streetlight and took a dozen hasty steps towards the prawn, who now more than ever seemed determined to get as far away from the human as it physically could, which wasn't saying much, since every time it made an attempt to stand, it fell over with a cry of pain.

"It's squealing" she commented with a bit of disgust.

"What?"

"Squealing! He's squealing, you know, like a pig!"

"That means it hurts a lot. Show him the sign!"

Ana put on her backpack and made the sign the way they had shown her with the help of her other hand. It was harder than it seemed. She tried her best to maintain the pose as she showed it to the prawn. And at that very instant, the prawn froze and looked at her with two big, curious eyes, then raised his own hand to show her three large, pointed fingers.

"I think he just answered."

"Good, that means he knows about the association. Get closer to him, see what's wrong."

Ana hesitated yet again, and Rineke seemed to notice, because he added "it's ok, he knows about us. I promise he's harmless."

Ana, who had watched the news way too many times, hoped with all her might that was true as she stepped even closer to the wounded prawn, who suddenly looked relaxed, like it knew it would all be alright now. They were now a scarce two meters from each other.

"Crap, he's looking at me from head to foot.

"Is he calm?"

"Yeah… looks calm."

"Can you see the damage?"

"Um, I think it's the leg. There's a lot of blood…"

"Are you from the group? Are you new?"

Ana stared. The prawn had suddenly spoken. Of course nothing she could understand.

"He's clicking something at me…"

"Pass the phone to him."

There was a moment's confusion in which Ana frowned before exclaiming "WHAT?"

"Put him on the phone, it's ok."

She shook her head in disbelief, but held the phone with the tip of her fingers and stretched out her arm so as not to get a single step closer to the alien, so much so that the prawn had to painfully stretch out himself to be able to reach it. He took the phone, gurgled something out of pain, or annoyance, then held the phone to the side of his spiky, tentacled head and chirped something in its language. Ana thought he kind of sounded like her CD player having a bad time trying to read a scratched disc.

Ana could hear the muffled, distorted voice of Rineke coming from the phone, but all in all she got nothing out of the conversation . Was Rineke speaking prawn as well? At one point the prawn stopped talking and handed her back her phone. She accepted it gladly.

"Look, I can't talk for long, family reunion, you know, so I'll make it short. He's been run over by a car and has missed his bus home. He can't walk. Do you live nearby?"

"Yeah…?" Ana mumbled suspiciously.

"You have to take him to your place."

"You got to be fucking joking!"

"If we don't get him out of the street, he'll be either detained or killed. Maybe both. It'll just be for the night, until the curfew's up.

"But… uh… I… do you even realize what you're asking? These things have-have _killed_ people before" she babbled.

"Ana, I know this guy, he won't give you any trouble, he's very smart."

"You mean monkey smart or police dog smart?" And as he didn't answer –some distant chattering going on in the background- she insisted. "Hello?"

"Look, I can't talk about this here, I'll call back as soon as I can."

"But…"

"Please, Ana" and he hung up, leaving Ana in some weird state of bewilderment. She almost forgot about the prawn that was staring expectantly at her from his kneeling position on the ground.

She quietly and slowly put her phone away with a sigh trying not to stare back.

"Ok, so…" she began. "I'm going to regret this. Get up, come on."

"Where are we going?" the prawn clicked incomprehensively.

She tried to ignore it and insisted.

"Come on, get up. Come _on_" she repeated, making gestures with her arms to make him understand. "Get up and let's go! We walk" she pointed "to my houuuuuse. My house, understand?"

"Yes, yes, I understand!"

The prawn didn't take his eyes off her as he planted his hands on the ground to push himself up and his breathing quickened. He slowly and clumsily got to his one good foot and made to stand up straight, but fell over with a squeal of pain.

"Oh, come on…" Ana moaned. "This is going to take forever."

The prawn gave it another try after shooting her an irritated look, but fell on his knees again with a grunt. Then he just sat there, looking determinedly at her like he was waiting for something.

"What?"

The prawn lifted his arm and held it in mid air, waiting for her to take it and help him up. Ana gave a sigh so slow and deep, the prawn took it like she wasn't going to get an inch closer to him, let alone touch him, so he sadly lowered his arm.

Ana hesitated, then gave a jerk in his direction.

"Ok… uh…" she reached for the prawn's arm like what she was about to touch was scalding hot and the prawn responded by happily giving her his arm.

She jumped at the first touch with the prawn's skin. It was hard and tough, but surprisingly smooth and just a bit moist. After a moment's indecision she helped the prawn up to his feet and tried not to let him topple over. He was breathing harshly now. Without warning he laid his entire right arm on her back and leaned on her shoulder with the left. She almost made them both fall on their noses with her reaction and the prawn gave another little squeal of surprise.

"Sorry! Ok…"

A sudden gush of air hit her left cheek and she gave a start.

Turning her head she saw the alien's throat just inches from her face and noticed the hollow folds on the soft skin open and close with the prawn's every breath. She hadn't had the chance to see it that day with Keith. Now she thought it was interesting, but utterly disturbing. Even in the city night's gloom, there were so many things different, or just plain wrong, about the alien now leaning his entire weight on her shoulders.

"Oh, my God, I'm touching an alien" she thought and almost let out a nervous giggle as they stumbled together towards her house's front door, praying nobody saw them from a window.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3 – There's a prawn on my couch**

_Translations from Poleepkwan_**  
**

The door swung open and Ana poked her head inside the dark and listened for signs that there was someone home. The place seemed deserted. It was much too early for Syrup to be home yet.

"Ok, come on" she helped the prawn pass through the narrow doorway, which still didn't prevent him from hitting his injured leg against the frame.

"Oh, jeez" she said, picking up a panty from the floor. "Sorry for the mess. My roommate's a pi… Wait, what am I saying? You're a prawn!" She threw the panty back on the ground and resumed carrying her guest.

By the time they had crossed the tiny sitting room in shadows and reached the sofa, the alien seemed ready to faint. She quickly set him down on the old couch. Then she violently pulled him back up again.

"Wait, wait, wait! Lean here for a sec" she patted the sofa's arm to make him understand and he exasperatedly, yet obediently did so while she dashed past a door and then came back with an old bed sheet and laid it over the sofa. Now that it was safe for the prawn to sit on the sofa –which he gratefully did– she took care of the lights.

The moment she switched the lamps on, and could see the prawn so damn clearly, she was overtaken by an uncomfortable anxiety and regretted doing so. Even in his condition he was pretty breathtaking, though she still wasn't sure whether that was a good thing or a bad thing.

The prawn's eyes blinked at the bright lights. His carapace was a of a general dark bluish color, with some lighter grey splattered here and there, especially around the eyes and in the throat. And that throat… There were those folds of soft tissue that pulsated at the rhythm of his tired breathing, and a couple of chunks of shell on either side of his thorax heaved back and forth agitatedly for air.

And not to mention that pair of stunted little hands that protruded from the base of his chest. In a moment's reasoning among all the astonishment, the rational part of her brain wondered what possible use they could have for them.

The fact that she had just carried that thing's weight on her back without losing herself to panic amazed her. But that strange creature was looking up at her with a couple of huge, intelligent gray eyes in a reverent sort of way, and his expression, exhausted but lively, left no place for doubt that there was any reason to fear him at all.

So, having understood that, she stepped over to the kitchen and soaked a rag in water and handed it to the prawn.

"Here, this is so you can wash. Wasssh" she mimicked the action of wiping oneself.

"_You know, I can understand everything you say_" he clicked, which she took as a thanking as he accepted the wet cloth from her and made to tend to his own leg.

That's when she noticed the striped black and white legwarmers he was wearing on both feet. He was wearing other things as well, like a single trouser leg on his right thigh and some kind of sash covering his waist, thin like a wasp's, though being almost all of it black they sort of blended in with his general appearance. Pieces of cord and strips of fabric with some random metallic objects dangling from them decorated his arms and thighs as well and –Ana grinned at this– a spike collar on his upper right arm.

The creature bent over itself and started pulling off the bloody legwarmer on his left talon. He gave soft whiny growls as he did so ever so carefully and then left the tattered, stained piece of cloth on the floor.

Ana winced sympathetically.

The exoskeleton was cracked almost from side to side and in one place it was even missing a chunk, exposing a soft, viscous substance inside. The prawn tenderly wiped the area with the wet cloth. He gasped and panted and gave little squeals of anguish until he gave up trying to clean the still bleeding wound and laid back to rest his head on the sofa.

Ana was doubtful.

"How do you take care of an alien?" she muttered to herself, then hastily moved towards the drowsy prawn. "Can I take a look?"

The prawn sat back up and laid out his left leg for her to see. At first she dared not touch the creature again, but looked at the damage from a distance. After a few seconds, though, she gathered all her courage and took the prawn's foot in her hands, gently turning it around and feeling worse for him every time. She looked up at him and saw his eyes full of exhaustion and dried up tears.

"There has to be something around here that can fix that" Ana said more to herself than to him as she got up and started looking around for something to patch up the open wound. "I know I saw it somewhere…" She shuffled around through some drawers and went inside another door, where more racket could be heard.

There was a bang and a smashing sound and Ana cursed loudly before resuming the search. Then with a cry of victory she came out carrying a roll of masking tape, then fetched the alcohol and some gauze and returned by the prawn.

"This is alcohol. Do you know if this will be any good on you?" she asked, holding up the bottle and pointing at the wound, hoping the prawn knew anything about it.

"Za'ih" he nodded resolutely and Ana took it as a good sign, so she got to work, and after a short while of complaining and apologizing, the wound was patched up with strong masking tape.

"There" she said, feeling rather proud of herself. "Let's hope that holds for now. Feel better?"

She hadn't expected him to give a reply, as she hadn't expected him to understand. But then he said weakly "Za'ih" and her mind clicked something together.

"How much of what I say do you actually understand?" she asked, frowning.

The prawn shrugged for lack of a better response.

"All of it?"

He shrugged again.

"Za'ih."

"Oh" she said trying to sound pleasantly surprised. Obviously she was surprised, just not pleasantly. All the possibly offensive things she had said in front of him started coming back to her.

She cleared her throat.

"You keep saying that. 'Zackee_'_ is it? Does that mean yes?"

"Yeah."

Ana blinked at this. He had actually said "yeah", though it had sounded croaky in his prawn voice.

"Right" she said. "Um… So what, you want something to eat, or drink, or…? How do you treat a prawn guest anyway?" she chuckled.

He shook his head, rejecting the offer.

"You sure?"

"Za'ih."

"Zackee, ok. I'll have something to eat, though. Don't move."

She walked over to the fridge and got some cheese and orange juice and returned to the prawn's side to find he had just fallen asleep, his head slightly tilted to one side, his breathing deep.

Ana dimmed the lights and laid the food on the table. After picking up the bloody legwarmer from the ground and throwing it away wrapped in a plastic bag, she sat on the armchair next to the sofa, keeping quiet. The food was gone in the blink of an eye and all that was left was her and the alien. She knew she wouldn't be able to just go to her bedroom and sleep. Not with a prawn sitting on her couch.

So she stood watch by the prawn, making sure she was there when it woke up. It would not be enjoyable to have it roam freely around the house. Luckily her cell phone would ring in a short while and then someone would come over to take the alien away so she could finally go to bed and forget about the whole thing.

Almost half an hour passed and the room was still as silent but for the slow breathing of her dormant guest. And that chair was beginning to feel a bit too comfortable. She found the sound of air wheezing in and out of the alien's lungs rather soothing. It was slowly lulling her to sleep. Her eyelids began to feel heavy.

Ana felt the call of nature sometime after midnight. Maybe a long time after midnight. It took her a few moments to regain full consciousness of the events that had taken place earlier that night. When she did she looked over at the prawn.

He was still sleeping peacefully, though at some point he had moved and laid down to rest his entire body on the couch. Ana watched him for a few seconds until her bladder gave a painful throb and she had to get up.

On her way to the bathroom she heard a snort and the prawn's breathing stopped. She turned around to see him peek over the couch's arm, looking for her.

"I'll be right back, keep sleeping."

Ana disappeared behind a door and the prawn shifted lazily on the couch and started looking around at the walls and ceiling, taking in all the details that he couldn't enjoy a few hours ago for exhaustion and pain. A short while passed in which he kept himself entertained with everything a single human's dwelling could offer visually, and then a sound of clicking door lock and he sat up to receive Ana.

But Ana was nowhere to be seen. Instead, the front door swung open and another female human entered the room noisily dropping a handbag on the ground and stumbled her way through the living room looking extremely sleepy. The prawn wished he could sink in the sofa and disappear, because the woman was about to walk right past him. He pushed himself hard back against the sofa in anticipation for a panicked reaction, but the human came into view and passed in front of the sofa so heavy-eyed she didn't even notice there was an alien sitting on it. Her hair was short and shone bright blue even in the dim light.

"Hey, Ana… going to bed…" she mumbled and went through a door, closing it behind her and leaving the shocked prawn staring in its direction. At that very instant, the door on the other end of the living room opened –sounds of flushing could be heard inside –and Ana came out of it looking suspicious.

"Is there a draft in here?" she said, frowning, before locating Syrup's handbag on the floor and realizing what had just happened.

The prawn started clicking stuff at her and pointed nervously at her roommate's bedroom door. Ana hurried over to the sofa, shushing him.

"Shut up!" she breathed "for God's sake, shut up!"

She tip-toed up to the closed door and listened. A few moments of silence later she opened the door just a bit. It was dark inside. Since Syrup didn't speak up, she presumed her to be already fast asleep. Syrup was a celebrated sleeper.

Ana exhaled with relief and turned to face the prawn. He was wide awake now, waiting tamely for her to make the next move.

"It's ok, she's asleep."

The prawn sighed and visibly un-puckered his tentacles.

"Didn't she see you?"

He shook his head. Ana wasn't surprised.

"How are you feeling?" she asked sitting back down on the armchair in front of him.

The prawn clicked something.

"So… What, better?"

"Za'ih."

"Ok, 'zackee' I understand. How do you say 'no'?

"Kau."

"Good, that's a start. So how's the leg? Think it will heal?"

"Za'ih."

"Will the shell grow back?"

The prawn took a sad glance at the bandaged up talon.

"Kau."

She clicked her tongue.

"Sorry to hear that… But… you will be able to walk, right?"

"I think so" he nodded.

"Good. I, uh… I threw away your legwarmer, it was completely destroyed. Hope you don't mind."

He nodded again, then turned his attention to his feet and seemed to ponder for a moment. Then he bent over and took off his right legwarmer and put it on his left leg instead to even up his look. He gingerly slipped the striped piece of cloth over the patched up talon and, having one last look at himself, decided he looked good enough.

Ana waited patiently until he was done and sat looking courteously at her again.

She smiled.

"My name's Ana."

The prawn made an odd gesture. Ana thought he could be smiling too, in his own way.

"Ana" he said with pretty good results, considering it was hard for a prawn to pronounce the 'n' sound.

"What's yours?" she asked.

The prawn spoke. He had told her his name, of that she was sure. She just couldn't make it out.

"Sorry, what was that?" she said feeling a bit embarrassed.

The prawn looked around. Ana was confused at first, thinking he had heard something, perhaps Syrup stirring in her bed, or worse, getting up. But he actually seemed to be looking for something. He turned his gaze towards the desk that stood in one corner of the room, flooded with papers and junk of the sort. Suddenly he began to rise. Ana reached out in a reflex, thinking he might fall. He clumsily stood on his good leg and hopped on one foot towards the desk, followed closely by Ana, who had subconsciously assimilated the responsibility of making sure he didn't hurt himself any further.

But he finally made it to the desk, took a nearby pen and turned to Ana with a notebook turned to a blank page. To Ana's amazement, he started scribbling in it in a slow, doubtful manner much like the way a child writes. When he was finished, he showed the words to Ana.

"Kyler Asher" she read. "That's your name? Kyler Asher?"

Kyler gave a satisfied huff.

"Kyler Asher" he repeated and this time Ana understood.

"But it's a human name. What's your real prawn name?"

Now Kyler shook his head, shrugging.

"Well, at least finally I have a name to call you. Here" she said, taking the notebook and the pen from him, "come back to the sofa, you may hurt yourself."

This time Ana held his arm on their way back. She began to notice how quickly she was getting used to the prawn's company. She helped him sit and before she could take away her hand, Kyler took it in his and started looking at it, making her a little uncomfortable, but still Ana let him softly pass his pointed fingers along the phalanges.

"I like your hands" he clicked finally letting go of her hand so she could sit in her chair, smiling awkwardly.

"You got strange hands too, especially the tiny ones" she giggled stupidly still recovering from the strange feel of the prawn's alien hands and gave him the notebook and the pen back. "So…"

Kyler listened politely.

"So you know Rineke?" she said, glad to have found something to talk about.

Kyler nodded.

"Za'ih."

"Yeah, he-he said he knew you. Do you guys hang out together?"

The alien made an inconclusive gesture, but said "za'ih."

"Can a prawn be in the group?"

"Yes, I'm in the group" he pointed a thumb at himself.

"_You're_ in the group. What do you do in the group, besides walking around, helping other prawns out?"

Kyler signaled toward Ana's ridiculously old and small TV set.

"You watch TV? That's what you do?"

Again the inconclusive gesture.

"Sometimes?"

"Za'ih."

Then a thought occurred.

"Can you watch TV in District 9?"

Kyler seemed glad she had asked him that.

"Kau."

"Oh, I see. "

It was strange. Suddenly she felt guilty for being human.

"So what else do you do?"

Kyler clicked something, mimicking the action of writing on the notebook.

"Really? They teach you to write?"

"Za'ih."

"That's how you learned to spell your name?"

"Za'ih."

Ana stared dreamily for a moment.

"Did Rineke teach you?"

"Za'ih" Kyler started writing again on the notebook, next to his name. He spelled the word 'teacher'.

"I thought he looked like a teacher" Ana confirmed. "And he actually understands pra… your language, doesn't he?"

Kyler nodded.

"How did he learn?" she exclaimed unable to understand how a person can ever learn to make out those clicks and gargles.

Kyler shrugged.

"He must be really smart" she commented distractedly.

There was a moment's silence. Kyler stared at her, and realizing how obvious she was seeming, she thought she saw a hint of understanding in the prawn's eyes. She felt her cheeks become warm, and cleared her throat.

"So how long have you been in the group?"

Kyler held up one prawn hand and, with his other one, touched the tip of each of the three fingers.

"Three… months? Years?"

Nod.

"How old is the group?"

He hesitated, then showed her five fingers.

"Do a lot of people know about it? Is it even legal? I heard mixed or non-human political parties were prohibited."

Kyler looked like he didn't know what to tell her that she could understand.

"You know? Never mind, it's not even important. Too many questions…"

Kyler was relieved.

"Hard to keep a conversation this way" she sighed. "Wanna watch TV?"

He nodded with not so much enthusiasm. Still, she needed a rest from trying to maintain a conversation through positive and negative answers only.

There wasn't much on TV at that hour. They couldn't afford many channels. After five minutes of watching some random depressing stuff on the 24h news channel, she noticed Kyler wasn't even looking at the TV, but curiously gazing around the room and occasionally at the notebook. She caught him taking a glimpse at her as well.

Ana thought he looked doubtful.

"This is getting on my nerves" she said pointing at the boring-looking anchorman in the TV before getting up to press the on/off button. "Nothing good at this hour anyway."

Kyler agreed and looked at her timidly.

"Something you wanna tell me?" she asked out of intuition.

Kyler looked hesitant for a moment, then grasped the notebook and started writing with a guilty expression on his face. Ana looked at the resulting words.

_I'm hungry._

"Oh!" She jolted, making Kyler jump and look warily at her, thinking perhaps he should've kept that to himself.

"Oh, ok, I'm sorry, I'll get you something!"

Kyler looked outright gleeful as Ana got up immediately and ran to the fridge. She thought she was starting to get the hang of the prawn's body language and felt rather pleased with herself. But as soon as she opened up the fridge's door, she froze.

"What do you guys eat, exactly?"

Kyler made to stand up, but she stopped him.

"No, no, don't get up, I'll tell you what I got. I got, uh… some pasta, chips, uh… spam, eggs… chocolate" she stopped to look at Kyler, who was staring with wide eyes, listening. He made a gesture that made her think any of what she had just said was good. "I'll just take out a few things."

Kyler then said something in that clicking language of his that she didn't understand, but he worriedly pointed in the direction of Syrup's bedroom and stared questioningly at her.

"What, you wanna eat my roommate as well?" Ana asked casually. "Sure, be my guest."

At first Kyler stared at her, frowning. And then he started giving off a series of shy but noisy huffs and guffaws, what most probably was the prawn equivalent of laughter.

Ana laughed with him.

"Don't worry, I'll tell her I had a friend over and ate it all, she won't even care that the food is gone" she added, satisfied that she had just made a prawn laugh, then returned to the sofa and placed everything on the table. Kyler seemed to be containing himself from jumping at the food.

"Would you like a fork?" she said, holding the metal object out to the hungry prawn. He took it, looking a little awkward, and turned it around in his fingers until the pose was right, then glanced at Ana for permission to begin. "It's all a little cold, but if you don't mind…"

Kyler shook his head eagerly.

"Dig in, then."

The most fun thing was watching him use the fork to get the food close to his tentacles so he could then use his mandibles to tug it in his mouth. She didn't see any evidence that there was any chewing involved in the whole process. And the weird thing was it didn't disgust her as much as she thought it would, disconcerting though it was.

"Have you had anything to eat at all today?" she asked shyly, unable to take her eyes off the scene.

Kyler briefly lifted his head towards her, shook it, then resumed eating. When he got to the eggs, Ana watched in bewilderment as he just seemed to drop them inside that cavern that was his throat without even bothering to break them open first. After that she decided to pick up a nearby magazine and read for the rest of the episode so she didn't have to look anymore, if only out of courtesy.

By the time the food was gone –and the fridge practically depleted –it was almost dawn. There was a mixture of lethargy and excitement in the whole situation that made Ana feel like the times she woke up from a nightmare, but without the fear. There was no fear. Kyler looked so grateful after the meal she automatically felt fond of the scary creature she had just met. All these contradictory emotions were making her drowsy, but the light horizon was reminding her of the urgency of the situation.

"You know? We should really go in my room, my roommate usually wakes up around this hour to do all the things she didn't do before bed, like… peeing and stuff" she explained. "Come on, I'll help you up."

And she did, holding him under his arm and offering her shoulder to serve as a walking stick. Kyler still couldn't set his wounded foot on the floor, so he hopped all the way to her room. He didn't complain as much, but Ana could tell it still hurt.

"Sit here, on my bed" and just as she sat him down on her mother's flowery bedcover, there came a knock on the front door and they both looked over in alarm. "Stay here and do not make a sound, ok?"

Kyler nodded with a worried look in his face and she hurried over to the entrance, closing the bedroom door behind her. Before she could check, a voice made its way through the wood.

"Ana? Are you there?"

It was Rineke. Ana gave a sigh of relief and opened the door.

"Hello."

"Hey, is everything alright? I tried calling you, but I think your phone was turned off" he said and he also looked relieved.

"Really?"

Ana checked her cell phone. It was, indeed, off. The battery had died, maybe hours ago, and she hadn't noticed.

"Huh…" she said curiously. "I… didn't notice… Too many things on my mind."

"Is Kyler here? Is he alright?"

"Yeah, yeah, he's –well, come in and –oh" she stopped dead in her tracks, for Syrup had just made her first appearance of the day in her star-patterned pajamas.

"Hi, Ana, what's going on?" she asked sleepily.

"Oh, I hope I didn't wake you" Rineke said politely.

Then Syrup seemed to take a better view of him. Ana could tell because suddenly her posture was upright and a little playful, and her gesture was now lively and awake.

"Oh, that's ok" she smiled. "Friend of yours, Ana?"

"Yeah, he's uh… well, this is Rineke. Rineke, this is… Syrup."

"Syrup" Rineke repeated in amusement as he took Syrup's hand in his. "Nice to meet you."

"You too. Will you stay for breakfast?"

"Uh, actually I was just passing by" he said and gave Ana a meaningful glance, which Ana took as a question of where was Kyler. "I need to get going right away."

"Oh… Well, come by any time, Rineke" Syrup said pleasantly.

"Alright. I'll… see you around, Ana" he winked, then closed the front door behind him.

Ana felt like she needed to do something to rapidly get Syrup out of the living room so Kyler could come through.

"Syrup, are you going to use the bathroom now? I'm just saying, cuz the water heater's broken again and there might not be enough warm water for the two of us. I was really feeling like taking a shower."

That was all it took. Syrup immediately assured her how very important it was that she took a shower now before going back to bed, since otherwise it was going to be difficult for her to fall asleep again. Ana pretended to be mildly upset with her and Syrup hurried off to get hold of the supposedly scarce hot water, leaving the way clear for Kyler.

When she went in her room, Kyler was distracted with the object that she had dropped before, when she was searching for the masking tape, thus breaking it open. It was an alarm clock, one of those old, really noisy ones. It was the only thing that could wake her at seven in the morning, and she had brought it here from her home back in her old city. It was such a pity that its clockwork now lay scattered on her bedroom floor.

Kyler had picked up a few pieces and was examining them closely, as well as the inside of the clock's carcass. He seemed to like it a lot.

"Rineke's here to pick you up" she informed, but the prawn didn't put the clock down. "You like it?"

"Yes, a lot."

"I was thinking of getting it fixed somewhere, but if you really want it you can have it."

Kyler looked up at her and back at the clock. There was no question. He was holding it the way someone would hold a kitten and barely took his eyes off it as Ana helped him across the living room, carrying the clock herself. When she opened the front door, Rineke was there waiting.

"Hurry now that no one's looking."

And together they got him across the tiny front yard to Rineke's car, in the copilot seat.

Rineke closed the car door and turned to face Ana.

"Thank you for not calling MNU, Ana" he said. "Yesterday could've ended much differently for Kyler if it hadn't been for you."

"Sure, I mean… no problem" she stuttered.

"I _will_ see you around, I hope" he added with a smile, placing his right hand on her shoulder, something that made her feel absolutely thrilled.

"Yeah" she answered, not really knowing what she was saying yes to.

Rineke got in the car and the car started. But before it moved, the copilot window opened up and Kyler peeked out from it and looked fixedly at Ana with his two big round eyes. The broken clock and all its loose cogs were sitting between his legs. He said "thank you" in the best English that he could manage and the car was off.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4 – Welcome to the Space Jam**

Ana could not deny that her experience with the prawn had affected her. In the days that followed she had no choice but to concentrate on her studies and work, which kept her very busy. And yet her mind kept trailing off and going absent as she wondered whether she should call and ask about Kyler's condition, since the wait for news was becoming unbearably and unexpectedly long. How ironic.

Of course, it was not like she cared that much, but was it really so hard to at least show they still knew she existed? She had found a wounded alien in the street and taken it to her home. She had cared for it, fed it and all without asking for anything in return but a little recognition, jeez. It had been the weirdest thing that had ever happened to her. It was slightly too much to just end like that.

So was that it?

It was not a choice of hers to care. She didn't even think she would be waiting for a call, but there she was sitting at her desk, with her head leaned on her hands, just looking at the textbook and not taking in a single word. After a while she gave up and slammed the book shut to go sit with her roommate.

It was a Friday afternoon and Syrup was watching TV, sucking on a lollipop that was nearly as blue as her hair, unaware of the little droplets of prawn blood that decorated the tapestry despite Ana's precautions the other day.

Ana let herself fall on the couch with a loud thud and Syrup nodded in her direction as if she were saying "I understand." Ana didn't think she did. Come to think of it, Ana didn't think she had ever discussed the aliens with her. Suddenly she was curious about her opinion. The words swirled around in her head for a while before she finally had the courage to speak them out.

"Have you ever seen a prawn, Syrup?"

The lollipop stopped turning in Syrup's mouth.

"You mean a non-human, right? Not the literal shrimp thing."

"Yeah, those, the... non-humans."

"Of course I have."

The lollipop retook its course.

Ana hesitated.

"So what do you think about them?"

Syrup waggled her head.

"They're cool."

For some reason that lifted Ana's spirits.

"I didn't know you related to them."

"I don't, I mean, not really. I don't know any of them personally. But I can almost mimic some of their words, listen to this!" She took the lollipop out of her mouth and gave off a series of growls and pitiful impressions of the prawn's clicks and gargles. Ana had to restrain herself from giggling. "Cool, eh?" Syrup added, clearly proud of herself. "I got it off a website. I think they even had a real prawn record the sample."

"So you wouldn't mind actually meeting one…"

"Well, you know? Personally I don't trust the media" Syrup commented, frowning secretively. "I think they cover stuff up. I bet you they do awful stuff to those prawns, it says so on the site."

"What's the site's name?"

"Prawsarelove . com."

Ana almost choked on her own saliva, but that funny-sounding website turned out to be pretty entertaining as she had the chance to find out the next day at the local library. The site specialized in discrediting MNU in every way possible and also had some curious information on prawns, like the disconcerting fact that they were hermaphrodites and their society being similar to that of termites or bees. She didn't have much time to have a deeper look because then her phone rang and, after being scolded by the librarian for noisemaking, she ran outside.

It was Rineke.

For some reason that she couldn't figure out herself she automatically straightened out the front of her shirt before answering.

"Hey, Ana."

"Oh, hi!" she said, sounding like she hadn't seen his name on her phone's screen. "What's up?"

"Well, we were planning to meet tomorrow Sunday at a friend's place to watch a movie or something. We were wondering if you'd like to come…?"

Ana got a series of contradictory thoughts. She didn't know exactly who would be there, or what it would be like, or if all prawns were as peaceful as Kyler.

"Um, I don't know..."

"I can pick you up at your house if you want."

That didn't sound too bad.

"Um, ok, but I don't know if… I don't think I'll be…"

How could she tell Rineke that she probably won't even be comfortable among prawns and not sound racist? One prawn, fine, but more than one…

"How many prawns will be there?" she asked cautiously.

"I don't know, probably the usual few, but we only invite the ones who behave, so you needn't worry about that."

Ana sighed. There was no way she could say no to Rineke.

"Ok" she agreed. "So what time?"

She also wondered whether Kyler would be there, though she didn't ask, of course.

"How does four o'clock sound?"

"Sure, cool."

"Great. I'll see you then."

"So how is, uh, Kyler doing?" she quickly interjected before he had a chance to hang up, and she practically did it against her own will.

"Good, good! He had to miss work for a couple of days, almost got fired."

"Kyler has a job?" Ana asked in amazement. She never thought that prawns could get or maintain jobs. Was that thinking too low of them?

"Yes, he has a job in the mining plant, like almost every other working non-human. He's pretty well set, though. He's the non-human supervisor."

"Really?" she was impressed.

"Thanks to an employee who's also from the group. He recommended him, made the boss realize how helpful it would be to have someone who can speak to the workers."

"Wow."

"He's the reason why they didn't fire him as well. Covered for him. Kyler adores him, no wonder. That's why he always wears the spike collar he gave him."

Ana remembered the spike collar on Kyler's arm and smiled.

"And now he's working again?"

"Yes, sadly. No vacations for them. They may take Sundays off, that's why we always meet on Sundays. Missing work is not tolerated. Kyler went back to work as soon as he could."

"But is he in any condition?"

"Well no, of course, but as a supervisor, he doesn't get to do so much physical work, luckily. We got him a crutch so he could walk. He's doing fine, he'll recover."

Ironically, Ana felt some relief.

"Glad to hear that" she said in all honesty.

"So we're counting on you then, right?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'll see you tomorrow."

"Great. See ya."

"Bye."

That night she barely slept at all, thinking about Rineke, and the prawns, and scolding herself for being so stupid as to go to a prawn reunion with a stranger. She knew it was crazy, she knew it was irresponsible, but yet she couldn't help thinking of something nice to wear the next day. If her parents ever found out about this…

Sunday afternoon arrived and Rineke knocked on her door at two minutes past four. Ana had been ready for half an hour already, and she was wearing one of her best tops and her new pair of boots. She loved boots. They made her feel more confident. She was going to need them today.

Rineke politely complimented her looks, making her cheeks burn –invisibly, she hoped- and they were off.

The entire ride Ana was doubtful of whether she should just jump out the window now before it was too late. But Rineke's company thrilled her, and his interest in her made Ana giggly. He asked about her home town, her parents, her studies… By the time the car was parked and they were walking down a sidewalk, Ana was already certain Rineke was very attracted to her.

They arrived at a wooden fence, and Ana's mind was nowhere near the aliens. There was a hand painted on the wood in black: a hand making the Vulcan sign. That sort of reminded her…

"This means it's a safe house for Poleepkwas in need of help. The Poleepkwas who know about the association know about this sign. It's effective and discreet" he smiled, then knocked on the fence, which Ana thought was a little strange, since there was no door.

But then a few boards swung open and a black woman in her mid forties appeared bearing a radiant smile and wearing bright patterned clothes.

"Hello, Rineke" she said, giving him one amorous hug.

"Good afternoon, Glenda! This is Ana" he said, grabbing Ana by the shoulders and placing her in front of him.

Glenda and Ana shook hands.

"Very nice to meet you at last, Ana. Rineke's told me about you. That was a noble thing you did for Kyler, dear."

"Nice to meet you too" Ana replied shyly.

"Well, come in, everybody's here and…"

There came a racket from inside the house; a screech and some voices. Ana vacillated. Glenda turned and approached the house's back door.

"Just a moment, one of our guests is a little anxious today." And she disappeared through the door, where more agitated noises could be heard.

Rineke led Ana to the backyard inside and she faltered, shifting nervously.

"Ana, I assure you" Rineke said as though reading her mind, and closed the fence behind him, "there is nothing to fear. Sometimes a new member gets…"

Boom! The back door blasted open and from it came a prawn swinging some metallic object and shrieking hysterically. Ana jumped closer to Rineke and froze. As the prawn stumbled disoriented around the backyard, throwing down a couple of chairs, a few more people came out of the house. Glenda was one of them. Ana was too distracted by the panic-stricken alien to notice the rest.

"Don't do that, dear" Glenda said to the prawn in the calmest voice one can manage when the person you're talking to is yelling wildly. "Nobody here's going to hurt you!"

But the prawn kept moving frantically, looking around for the exit, until he seemed to remember where the entrance was located and ran towards Ana and Rineke not taking his eyes off the small huddle of people.

He was so busy checking that he wasn't followed by any of the people after him, that he almost crashed into Ana if it hadn't been for Ana's cry of shock, which luckily made the alien turn his head and slide on his feet before coming to a halt just a couple of feet away. He jumped and backed away quickly, and Ana recognized the metallic object. It was a machete. It was swaying in the prawn's hands giving off dangerous metallic reflections apparently ready to strike, but the prawn never made up his mind as the group of people behind him spread out across the yard, trying to make him calm down.

Then Ana saw the tattered skirt and suddenly recognized the alien. And judging from the look in the alien's eyes, he recognized her as well. It was the prawn that Keith had abused that night, it was the first live prawn she had ever seen. Now he stood before her, breathing agitatedly and holding the machete up with both hands, staring in her direction.

Rineke took one small step forward, leaving Ana behind, who pushed her back against the fence as though she hoped to be able to pass through it.

"Calm down now, put down the machete" he said in a smooth voice, and the prawn answered by rapidly shaking his head and backing up another step before remembering there were more people behind him.

Terrified though she was, Ana managed to notice the tearful look in the alien's eyes, and she wished they would just let him go.

"Look, we'll call off all these people, ok?" Rineke said. "Guys, get inside the house, nothing's going to happen."

"Yes, go inside, all of you" Glenda echoed and two other humans and another prawn hastily went through the door one at a time.

"Come on now, see? Everyone is gone, nothing to fear, please, put… down… the sword."

The prawn looked at each and every one of them; Glenda, then Rineke, and then more extendedly at Ana, who kept quiet, trying not to give him any more reasons to be scared. Ironic, because she was just as scared. The prawn slowly lowered the machete looking slightly embarrassed, but didn't let go as he began to click something at them.

"We can't let you out , not like this" Rineke told him. "You could call the attention, the whole neighborhood could see you, and see us with you."

More nervous clicking.

"Who would want to hurt you?"

More clicking, and as he spoke, he began to back away a little more, slowly getting closer to Ana.

"I promise, darling" Glenda added, keeping her distance "no one here's going to hurt you, we're all helpers, I promise you."

The prawn looked doubtful, but seemed a bit calmer.

He glanced sideways at Ana. He looked in the verge of tears, but bowed his head timidly, the machete dangling from one of his hands, and everything became gradually more relaxed.

Ana didn't dare to move. For some reason the prawn was giving his back to her and was closer each time, so that both the prawn and Ana were facing Glenda and Rineke, like two teams in a game of dodge-ball. Ana noticed he was shaking slightly.

"What happened, then? Tell us" Rineke encouraged him in a way a teacher would ask a pupil for his contribution to the lesson.

The prawn spoke again and Rineke listened politely.

"Did someone hurt you?"

Even in her incomprehension, Ana could tell the prawn was stuttering.

"If no one here hurt you, why are you so scared?"

The prawn hesitated, then shrugged. Glenda approached him, holding out her hand in a helpful manner.

"You don't look good, come, sit down."

But the offer wasn't acknowledged. The alien shook his head and backed away a little more, placing himself at Ana's side, as if looking to her for protection. Such was the memory it had of her from that night? In a surge of bravery, Ana decided, despite her survival instincts, not to let him down. She stayed close, thinking it was now her duty to somehow help the poor creature, providing some emotional support, even if it was just by being there.

He spoke once more.

"You don't have to come in yet if you don't want to. We won't make you."

The alien chirped.

"No, dear, don't go. We can't stop you, but don't go" Glenda pleaded.

"Look, I realize you probably have a lot of reasons to fear us, but we really want you to give us a chance" Rineke told the alien. "You have the machete, you have the upper hand. You can keep the machete if that will make you feel better, alright?"

The prawn nodded timidly, apparently giving in at last, but still somewhat restless.

"Ok, then, when you're ready we can…"

The prawn unexpectedly took Ana's hand and Ana jumped and yelped in surprise. The prawn jumped as well with a screech before stumbling away from Ana, knocking down an iron grill and falling to the ground. It would've been funny in other circumstances.

Ana was expecting another defensive move, but the prawn remained on the ground moving with difficulty, looking disoriented. He had dropped the machete, which lay a couple of feet away from him, and Ana felt guilty at once for having scared him so much.

"Are you ok, dear? Here, sit, there you go."

The poor creature was in such a state of shock he even tolerated Rineke's and Glenda's help to stand up and take him to a nearby chair where he sat gladly, taking short, forceful breaths.

"Calm down now, you'll give yourself a heart attack."

Ana stepped back and forth before making up her mind to go near the prawn now crying his eyeballs out. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to scare you" she said in a small voice, hoping he would hear. Her own heart was pounding fiercely.

"That's it, all good. All a misunderstanding" Glenda said softly with her hand on the prawn's back. The alien was looking embarrassed now, but agreed to come inside if he could carry the machete with him and be near the exit.

Rineke picked up the prawn's machete from the ground and brought it to him. The prawn took it from him with a look of disbelief.

"Now whenever you feel, we can go and watch a movie with the others" Glenda went on. "Have you ever watched a movie on TV?"

The prawn shook his head.

"Ooh, you'll like this movie, you'll see. All the other Poleepkwas are comfortable here, and they can't wait to meet you."

Ana watched until Rineke walked up to her.

"Let's go inside. I'll introduce you."

"Will he be alright?"

"Yes, don't worry, Glenda is a great woman, she knows how to handle things."

And with one last look at the tearful prawn, feeling utterly empathetic for him, Ana was led through the house's back door and into a modest yet cozy kitchen, where a few people stood waiting anxiously.

"How is she?" asked Amelia, whom Ana had just noticed there.

"A little shaken, but she'll do fine. Just try to be very gentle around her."

Ana frowned. Her?

"And on her first day. Poor thing…"

The big prawn that was with them made a comment Ana couldn't understand.

"Glenda knows what she'd doing. Now, let's see!" Rineke clapped his hands, livening up the mood. "Who's come today?"

"Ooh, everyone's here already. Josh is downstairs preparing the movie."

"Great. People, let me introduce you to Ana. Amelia, you already know her."

Ana timidly shook Amelia's friendly hand and the chains and bracelets in the goth girl's arm jingled gleefully.

"Great to finally see you here!" she squeaked.

"And this is Neil…"

"Hi" said a mid-age man dressed in business clothes, shaking her hand tightly.

"He's our spy at MNU" Rineke whispered loud enough that everybody could hear and chuckle. "And Jasper!"

The tall, cinnamon colored, confident-looking prawn took one step forward and held out his hand. Ana made her best not to appear shaky and took Jasper's hand as firmly as she could, feeling the hard, pointed fingers on her palm.

"You'll recognized him from the night we first met."

She opened her mouth, surprised.

"Oh…!"

Jasper nodded in appreciation.

"We thought, him being there when we rescued the poor girl, that she would take to him better, so we commended him the task of accompanying her on her first day, but it turns out she's more scared of her own kind than of us."

"The poor thing must have been through so much…" added Amelia.

"And now that we all know each other, let's get downstairs."

Rineke opened a door and stood aside so that everybody could go down the staircase that was behind it, then invited Ana to follow them with a gentle movement of his hand.

But Ana halted and sniffed the air.

"I think I smell something burning…" she said.

Rineke jumped.

"Ooh!" He ran to the door and stuck his head outside. "Glenda! Your cookies are burning!"

There was some loud cussing, and then "don't worry, dear, it's just my cookies burning. Would you like to come and help me in the kitchen?"

A few moments later, Rineke was holding the door for the prawn with the ragged flowery skirt, who was still carrying his- _her_ machete and looked at Ana with glassy eyes. Ana timidly raised her hand and waved it. The prawn seemed to feel better after that.

Glenda led the prawn across the kitchen and opened up the oven door to a cloud of smoke. "Whoops" she said. "No matter, see? We scrape off the black parts and…"

Rineke left the two of them there and came to lead Ana downstairs.

"So this is not a… political party or anything, right?" she asked casually as they descended, still worried about the illegality of what they were doing.

"No, no" he said plainly. "Nothing political, we just try to be of help."

The voices coming from downstairs grew louder and Ana and Rineke entered a big basement filled with a dozen people, some sitting in sofas and chairs. The entire room seemed to have been rearranged to imitate a movie theater, with a big screen TV up front. There was some pop music playing in the background. Everywhere she looked, humans and prawns were chatting friendly and even hugging. Hugging! Not a lot of people noticed Ana's arrival, but a young man who looked like he could be a relative of Glenda's did approach them with an air of joyfulness. He turned first to Rineke.

"Damn, professor, you gotten uglier since the last time I saw you?"

Ana sensed a healthy envy for Rineke's natural good looks.

"It's very nice to see you too, Josh."

They both shook hands affectionately, then gave each other a hug.

"Aw, I got my hopes up, you're still too pretty for this world."

"Oh, come on, Josh, stop it" Rineke protested and they laughed and punched each other some more. "Josh, this is Ana. Ana, Josh."

"Hi, Ana, welcome!"

"Thank you" she mumbled shyly.

"We got two newbies tonight, awesome! Rineke introduced you around yet? Oh, wait, no, don't touch that!" and he hurried off. Then Ana saw the most captivating thing she had seen all day.

It was a prawn, but it was small. It was prawn pup, and it was strangely cute, barely the height of a five-year-old human and three times as thin. It was playfully nibbling on a Playstation remote control. Josh bent over the child and gently took the remote's handle from the little one's mouth.

"You don't eat this, no" he said tenderly.

An adult prawn then came and picked the child up from the ground, clicking something at Josh, who cordially waved his hand at him.

"That's alright, man, no problem" he said. "Kids will be kids, eh?"

Then he patted the prawn's arm and began to roll the remote's cable, by which time Ana had set her eyes on a certain dark-colored prawn that was standing leaning on the wall in the opposite corner of the room, looking around curiously with his arms crossed. She stared hopefully because she thought she recognized Kyler.

But as soon as the prawn caught sight of her through slitted eyes, she knew she was mistaken. Ana quickly turned her gaze somewhere else, but she knew the prawn's keen eyes were still on her.

"I'm going over here for a sec, ok, Ana?" Rineke said.

"What?" she replied distractedly, but Rineke was already off to talk to Neil, the MNU employee she had met before, leaving her alone in the middle of a room filled with strangers. She would've been annoyed with Rineke for this, but the sight of the dark prawn coming towards her occupied her entire mind immediately.

The dark prawn made his way through the forest of people and prawns and stepped up to Ana, who took one step back at the vision of the towering alien looking down on her small figure. He wasn't just dark-colored, he was black with bright red markings across his torso, and very sturdy.

"*You must be the new girl."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to stare! I thought you were someone else…!"

"Black Jack! I see you've met Ana."

Josh had just showed up from behind the black prawn and friendly patted his back, so that the prawn gave him what Ana saw as an annoyed look.

"*We haven't met" Black Jack clicked. "I was just curious for the scared human female."

Josh laughed, making Ana confused.

"You sly dog" he chuckled, then turned to Ana. "Ana, this is Jack, some of us call him Black Jack."

"*I have a much better name than that, I only use that for your sake" Jack said, holding out his hand. Ana needed a moment to realize he wanted to shake. She took it uncertainly.

"We know you have a better name, Jack" Josh said so that Ana could get a glimpse of the conversation. "But many of us don't understand your language, like Ana here."

"*I know" Jack said with a hint of annoyance, "I apologize if I've led you to misinterpret my actions."

"Jack says he apologizes if he's made you misinterpret his actions."

Ana nodded, blinking rapidly. She showed him a shy smile for lack of words

"You know what? Jack is our crowning achievement."

"*Don't push it."

"No, really, he used to get in a lot of trouble."

The black prawn rolled his disturbingly bright eyes and noticed the prawn was missing a tendril. Lost in battle, perhaps? Wouldn't surprise her.

"*I'm only here for Jasper."

"Right. He's a friend of Jasper's. Jasper finally convinced him to come along once in a while."

"Ana, come, I got us a couple of chairs" said Rineke's voice from her side, and she hurriedly excused herself to go with him, making a quick scan of the room for the real Kyler.

But Kyler wasn't in the room. She wondered secretly when he would be coming.

"So how are you getting along so far?" Rineke asked as they were sitting down.

"Oh, well, good" she replied.

"Come on, Ana, you feel awkward, you can say it" he laughed. "Everybody does at first. You should know you're doing incredibly good, actually."

"Huh" she said hopefully. She liked hearing good things from Rineke."Really?"

"Yes, give yourself a while. It's the first time you've been among non-humans. Who've you met up to now?"

Ana looked around the room.

"Uh, well, there's Josh, and Amelia, and that's Thomas over there, right?"

"Right."

"And I just met… Black Jack. And the one upstairs with, err… Glenda. Are Josh and Glenda related?"

"Yes, Glenda is Josh's aunt. She's been so generous with the association, you have no idea. Josh's parents don't know about any of this, and he's afraid to tell them. But Glenda has provided this house for most of our meetings and always insists on cooking something."

"That's so nice of her" Ana said, impressed with the woman's charity.

"And speaking of which…" Rineke pointed towards the staircase, where Glenda had just showed up followed by the she-prawn. They were both holding trays of cookies, and the prawn cowering behind Glenda was still carrying the machete in one hand, looking around in distrust, yet moderately calm.

"Ok, people, round up for some!" Glenda announced, and everywhere around the room, people were standing up and heading for the trays chattering their approval. The she-prawn left her tray next on a table to Glenda's, and backed away quickly from the flow of people, but didn't run. Glenda grasped her arm protectively and invited her to sit down near the exit.

Ana and Rineke arrived at the table and Rineke grabbed a few cookies for both him and Ana, who had politely stayed away from the crowd. He handed her a couple of cookies and looking at them she realized they were shaped as both men and prawns.

"That's cute" she giggled.

Rineke seemed pleased.

Ana noticed there was not a single alcoholic beverage on the table but juice and milkshakes, which just didn't seem normal to her.

"Absolutely no drinking" Rineke answered when she made the comment. "They're not allowed to drink and we don't want to get them, or the group, into trouble. Come, you haven't met everyone yet."

And he took her by the arm towards a group of people and prawns. One by one he introduced her to everybody in the room that she hadn't met yet. Thomas was there and looked positively overjoyed among all the prawns. He greeted Ana with enthusiasm and Ana was actually glad to see a mildly recognizable face.

"Finally I get to put all my Poleepkwan into practice."

"He means the language" Rineke clarified in her ear.

"All these months of preparation have been worth it" he continued. "All thanks to the brilliant Fanny's website and her "Learn to speak Poleepkwan" course."

"You sound like a salesman, Thomas" the young woman in multicolored tights, called Fanny apparently, laughed at Thomas's comment.

Thomas gave a demonstration of his Poleepkwan by speaking to Jasper, who stared at him looking amused. Then everybody gave a few chortles of laughter, including the prawns that were present.

"That was hilariously pathetic" Black Jack said and Thomas looked positively pleased with himself.

Something brushed Ana's leg and she gave a start before realizing that a white ferret had just made its way across her feet looking for scraps. Jasper, the cinnamon-colored prawn, picked it up gingerly and held it like a bag of sugar. Black Jack stood beside him looking solemn. The ferret didn't seem to mind, as it was being fed the heads of the prawn-shaped cookies by another prawn. This one had reddish-brown spots over a beige base and was wearing a light shirt with the sleeves torn out. It was the prawn that had picked up the little one a while ago.

"These" Rineke went on "are Jennifer…" a hippy-looking woman with dreads in her hair shook Ana's hand "…and Samuel."

Ana immediately liked Samuel's calm appearance and had little trouble shaking his alien hand, especially after the little one had come up to him with his arms outstretched and he had picked him up again so he could pet the ferret.

"And this little guy is his son, Saskia."

Saskia had the colors of his daddy. He turned his big, fascinated eyes to Ana and she wondered, with eyes so big, how there could be enough space left in that little head for a brain.

She couldn't stop herself. Leaving aside her fears and uncertainties, Ana reached out and softly patted the top of the little one's head.

After that everything was so much easier. Ana started to feel better about the idea of sitting down with a bunch of aliens to watch a movie. A short while later, Josh's voice thundered over the constant chattering, making the she-prawn jump on her seat.

"Alright, people, settle down, movie time!"

Jasper clicked something at him.

"Today" Josh replied "we are watching E.T."

There was a general murmur of approval and someone said "I love that little squashy bugger!"

They all sat down in their own seats and sofas, the she-prawn and Glenda keeping close to the exit, and Josh stood facing the public. Ana thought he had the showman's ease of manner.

"Welcome to another session of the Theater of Glenda! We have two newbies in the audience today, so let's make them feel at home. I think you've all met Ana" he pointed his hand at Ana, and she looked around embarrassed as the faces of all humans and prawns smiled in her direction. "Our other new member is Eleanor, who is sitting waaay over there. Eleanor, care to stand up?"

Ana saw the she-prawn's antennae dance as Eleanor shook her head vigorously.

"That's alright, you don't have to. Anyway, Eleanor, welcome. We're glad to have you here and we hope you'll be comfortable" Josh said gallantly and Eleanor just blinked thoughtfully.

"I thought the website said prawns were… hermaphrodites?" Ana asked Rineke.

"Poleepkwas, Ana. And yes, they are hermaphrodites, but some Poleepkwas can feel more feminine than others."

Josh went on.

"Now if everybody will be so kind as to cram a sock in it and shut up, we may begin. Please keep your antennae low so the people in the back can see and enjoy the movie."

There was a short round of applause and some clicking and chattering as Josh sat down and the Universal Studios logo appeared on the screen.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5 – Prawn phone home**

"Elliot, you're crazy" muttered the boy in pajamas as he ventured into the thick, dark foliage armed with one flashlight and one pair of socks on his otherwise bare feet. The crickets chirped and the dry grass crackled, but aside from that it was all too quiet in the chilly nighttime.

The boy reached a brick wall and suddenly a strange quiet gurgling joined the sounds of the night, guiding Elliot in the dark until he found a trail of footprints, three-fingered, unlike anything he'd ever seen. He followed them despite the fear towards another forest of tall dry plants and the gurgling grew clearer. Stem after stem he made his way through, and after a few steps he uncovered a creature ugly and nightmarish.

The creature growled and screeched, waving its arms before it, and Elliot screamed, his flashlight falling from his grasp.

All around Ana there were cries of surprise and some laughter. She jumped slightly on her seat herself. After regaining posture she noticed Eleanor had got up and was attempting to flee from the scene. Glenda gently grabbed her arm and soothed her with reassurances that it was not real, it was only a movie. A tale told with images.

Everyone else was having a real blast, or so was Ana's impression. She couldn't help noticing the parallelism of E.T.'s first encounter and her own. It was creepily similar, she thought. Incidentally, she kept expecting to see Kyler show up through the door, but no one came in or out.

After a while she realized a lot of them had already seen the movie at least a few times, because Jasper kept imitating E.T.'s vocalizations surprisingly well. Every time E.T. did something funny he was echoed by Jasper, who seemed to know exactly when and what was going to happen.

Throughout the movie, the collective emotions of the people present in that basement see-sawed up and down, from jubilation to expectation and melancholy.

"We could be happy here. I could take care of you! I wouldn't let anyone hurt you. We could grow up together, E.T." Elliot said in his childish innocence, while Ana couldn't help thinking how wrong Elliot was. E.T. could never be a part of Elliot's world. If people found out about him…

To her side, Jennifer and Samuel were cuddled together, their eyes fixed on the screen. And thus they remained until drama unfolded. E.T. was dying, and everybody in the room was silent but for the quiet clicks of little Saskia, who pointed at the TV begging for an explanation. Jennifer held him closer. Even Eleanor was staring fixedly at the screen, and Glenda smiled at her astonishment.

"You're killing him, you're killing him!" screamed Elliot at the working medics all surrounding E.T.'s inert figure. Every human and prawn in the basement was quiet and probably hardly breathing, Ana thought, since every now and then she found out she was hardly breathing herself.

The audience underwent a confusing flow of emotions as suddenly it turned out E.T. lived! And that his people were calling him! It was so touching to see all of Elliot's schoolmates sticking with them all throughout the chase in the bikes.

Then a reverent silence flooded the room when Elliot and his alien friend were finally facing the spaceship, for this meant goodbye.

"I'll be right here" E.T. pointed his incandescent fingertip at Elliot's forehead with a smile. Then he bent to pick up the flowerpot, a souvenir from planet Earth, and turned to climb the ramp. Harvey, the golden retriever, climbed after him as if he, too, wanted to say goodbye and then got back to his waiting human owners.

The ramp was lifted, but E.T.'s silhouette remained visible through the metal grid, and you could just make out a hint of the alien's eyes looking in your direction as the door like a camera shutter started closing itself and the music turned to a calm, melancholy flute. The last thing that everyone got to see of E.T., the last thing ever, was that surreal reddish glow in his chest. All around Ana, tiny pins of reflected light glowed in every pair of eyes, hardly blinking. Rineke looked around as well and Ana caught him smiling to himself as if pleased with what he was seeing.

The ship's engine gave a blast ruffling everyone's hair and shaking the trees around them and it was off. The music escalated to a triumphant finish and in everybody's faces both inside and outside of the screen there were smiles and tears.

"Listen to that music" Rineke commented. "Long live John Williams."

She had never heard of that John Williams, but the others seemed to know him well.

"Aye!"

"Hear, hear!"

"Chirp!"

And then E.T. was gone.

The image faded to black, and the mysterious main theme started to play with the coming of the credits, leaving Ana with an awkward feeling of despair, knowing Elliot would never see his friend ever again. She had seen this movie once, a long time ago. She barely remembered it, but she did know there was no sequel to this. She guessed that after a few recent events in her life, E.T. the Extraterrestrial had suddenly gained a lot more meaning.

But could she relate already? She had just begun to get acquainted with prawns, yet she already felt like somehow she belonged to a separate part of human society. She realized everybody in that room had a reason to relate to either Elliot or E.T., and thought "good choice" while looking to her sides to check on other people's reaction.

Samuel was tenderly wiping a tear from Jennifer's cheek with the tip of his finger, almost with curiosity, just like E.T. had done. He gently clicked something at Jennifer that made her smile wetly. "You promise?" she asked.

All this interspecies love was making her dizzy. Not that she was disgusted, it was just too… weird.

The lights were turned back on and the room was quickly rearranged so that they could all lounge and talk. The prawns helped and Ana noticed how they seemed to move the sofas around with little effort; they certainly appeared physically stronger than human beings.

After they were all comfortable, a friendly discussion about the movie developed. They all seemed to take it very seriously. And, as Rineke explained, since there were two newbies in the group tonight, an introduction to the meaningfulness of this movie for the association was dedicated to them.

"A lot of us have watched this film for quite a few times" Rineke said to Ana and Eleanor especially, "so you'd think there's not much more to say about it. But on the contrary, it seems to bring up new doubts and questions to all of us every time we see it. Personally I see movies as an excellent form of teaching. They have a way of making the viewer feel sympathy for the characters, see through their eyes, even when they are, pun intended, alien to him."

Everyone laughed.

" It's a great way of seeing things from a million points of view and that's why we watch certain movies here, usually the ones who involve characters that aren't human."

"I have a question" interjected Jennifer "for all the Poleepkwa here tonight."

Rineke gladly let her speak.

"We all know" she started "that your ship is… inoperable, somehow. We've all been told the Poleepkwa are here to stay. But I've heard otherwise...

"There's a rumor going around inside D9 that something is being done to… fix it, in some way. I don't know how, and I don't know if the rumor's true, but it's still made me wonder. If the ship was fixed, and it meant you could all go home… would you go?"

There was a short thoughtful silence all around, broken only by Black Jack's deep voice.

"*Of course we would."

Ana didn't understand the phrase, but the severity in his voice was still apparent.

"*I wouldn't" Jasper popped up.

Rineke was kind enough to roughly translate the Poleepkwan for Ana.

"*We live in a Slum! The human oppression means nothing to you?" Jack fumed at his friend.

"*There's more than that. And we did not live in luxury before either."

"*It was better than this" he growled.

Jasper shook his head.

"*No, I have found things here."

"But Black Jack's right, isn't he?" said Jennifer. "The conditions you live in are enough to make the most peaceful person rebel. I know I would."

Black Jack seemed conflicted that a human was agreeing with him.

"*What can you say about this? You sound as if you don't consider yourself a part of humanity, human." That last word had a cruel emphasis to it.

Samuel sat up straight as if challenging Black Jack to be insulting with Jennifer again.

"*You flare at one of the few humans that will stand for your cause!" he exclaimed.

"*Spare me, buddy. We all know what sort of relationship you have with humans."

"I have told you before" said Glenda all of a sudden in a tone that left no place for a comeback. "You are not to insult in my house! You better cut it out or I will kick your hard, spiky butt outta here! You got it, BJ?"

Black Jack gave Glenda a scornful look but kept quiet and after a short moment leaned back on his seat. Ana was impressed.

"Thank you, Glenda" said Rineke with all the easygoingness in the world. Glenda straightened her colorfully patterned skirt and sat back down with Eleanor, who now looked even happier to be in Glenda's team.

"*I did mean it, though" continued Jasper. "I wouldn't want to go back, there are too many things I would leave behind forever."

"*Me too" seconded Samuel holding Jennifer's hand tight.

"If you did go back" Amelia said "like if you had no choice, which I hope will not be the case, what are the things you would miss most?"

"*TV!" Jasper exclaimed and the rest chuckled. "*The movies, E.T…."

"Pocahontas…" added Sam and Ana frowned, bewildered, because she had actually understood the word without Rineke's translation.

"*Oh, The Muppets…"

"*But especially PoHA, Glenda's burnt cookies" everyone laughed at Sam's comment. "I would miss so many smells..."

"Smells?" Fanny giggled.

"He means you, Fanny" Josh said and started noisily sniffing her hair like a hound.

Fanny shrunk away from Josh's invasive nose, shaking her arms and laughing nervously. Eleanor watched with curiosity.

"What would you miss, Jack?" Rineke asked the serious prawn, who looked around as everyone became momentarily quiet to listen.

"*Absolutely nothing."

Nobody dared to contradict him.

"What would you miss, Eleanor?"

The thin prawn raised her head in surprise when she heard her name being called and needed a few moments to react.

"*I don't know…"

"You can talk to us, Eleanor."

"Go on, dear" whispered Glenda. "Tell them what you told me, it's alright."

Eleanor hesitated, but said "*I was born on Earth, I wouldn't know what to expect if I had to… go home. I guess in a way this already is my home…"

Ana noticed Black Jack giving Eleanor a sort of annoyed but curious look.

"So you're happy here?"

Eleanor took her time to answer.

"*I'm… adapted… sort of."

"I'm sure we can be of help."

"We're glad to have you, El" Amelia smiled in her direction and Eleanor seemed uncertain but hopeful.

"We still have to assign you to a sponsor" Rineke commented. "We had thought of assigning you to Jasper, but it's up to you to decide."

"*Sponsor?"

"An older member to guide you on your first steps in PoHA."

Eleanor lowered her eyes to the floor as if ashamed of something.

"*I don't…"

"Why can't it be Glenda?" asked Neil, who, despite his undivided attention on the discussion, had been pretty quiet up to then.

El lifted her head hopefully to look at her protector.

"*He's right" said Jasper without a hint of reproach. "*She seems comfortable with Glenda."

"Well, we usually assign Poleepkwa members to other Poleepkwa members so that they can keep track on each other easily" said Rineke "but if Eleanor would like that, and Glenda will oblige…"

"*Yes" the slim prawn muttered shyly.

"Oh, sure" Glenda said and dedicated Eleanor a grateful smile. "I would be delighted."

So it was settled. Eleanor was then told she was completely free to go home now and rest whenever she felt, since she had been through so much stress. However she decided to stay a little longer as a show of faith, as long as she was with Glenda.

"So this is like Alcoholics Anonymous. The sponsor thing, I mean" Ana asked Rineke at one time.

"Yeah, something like that. It's usually the same few who sponsor newbies. Jasper has been the sponsor of tens of Poleepkwas" Rineke commented. "Including Black Jack there."

"So can he be a sponsor for more than one prawn at the same time?"

"Poleepkwa, Ana. Black Jack hasn't been with us for very long, but we consider his newbie period to be over, although Jasper has been sponsor for more than one Poleepkwa at a time, yes."

"So what do sponsors do, exactly."

"Basically they're guides for the new members. They give them an introduction to our purpose, explain the rules, encourage them to adapt, for example by promoting a paid job. Although PoHA will help any Poleepkwa in need for food, shelter or any basic necessity, we do expect our members to learn to take care of themselves and be independent. That includes getting a job instead of being scavengers or thieves for a living. Or living off our charity... A job in the human world, however tough and unfair, is a step towards acceptance."

"So you're like my sponsor, right?"

"In a way" he laughed "though it's usually not humans who need the help, that's why we don't assign sponsors for human members."

The sun was low in the sky and everybody was sitting around in small groups, talking in both human and Poleepkwan. There were constant shows of affection between the two, something Ana still needed to get used to, but the closest two seem to be Jennifer and Sam. There was a love among those two that was tender even to the eyes of Ana, and she commented this to Rineke.

"They seem to have such affection for each other."

Rineke smiled and answered "They would. They're a couple."

At first Ana just huffed, amused. Until reality got hold of her.

"You mean like… with… relations?"

"Yes" Rineke shrugged.

"Oh, my… GOD!!!" she exclaimed, looking intensely in the direction of the couple.

"Now, Ana, it's impolite to stare."

Ana turned to Rineke. He had said that almost like he thought he was being funny. Maybe he WAS being funny…! But she was more convinced of the veracity of it the more she watched Jennifer and Sam together.

"I'm sorry, it's just… HOW?!" she kept crying out, and some unnoticed inner part of her conscience was desperately shushing her, hoping they wouldn't hear her exclamations.

"I call it the Cheese Grinder" Josh said, suddenly appearing at one side.

"Josh, shut up."

"Yes, professor" he giggled.

Rineke turned back to her.

"You'll get used to this, Ana. Notice I'm not blaming you…"

Blame? You can blame me? Ana thought.

"…I blame prejudice induced upon you by human society."

"Right" she giggled, though inside she was still picturing things she did not want to picture.

"It's getting late" Rineke looked at his watch. "And the Poleepkwa will be leaving soon for their curfew. Maybe you've had enough for today, eh?"

"Yeah" Ana agreed. Suddenly she was feeling a little claustrophobic. She was amazed at Rineke's watchfulness.

"I hope you won't be so disappointed in us that you won't want to come back" he said, walking her to the basement's exit door.

"Oh, no, it's… I'm just a little tired, and…"

She saw Jasper poking Amelia's temple with his finger and saying "ouch." Amelia pretended to be annoyed.

"Well, like you said, it's enough for one day" Ana added.

"You did good, Ana" he laughed. "Bye, people! Taking Ana home!"

Everybody answered, though all she could make out was the humans' words.

"Bye!"

"Bye, Ana, see you soon!"

Rineke made one gallant hand gesture towards the staircase and after waving at the room behind her, Ana climbed. Anything to get those images off her mind, she thought.

On their way up, Neil crossed their path. He was holding a cell phone.

"Rineke, a word?"

"Of course. Ana, go ahead and wait for me outside, I'll be right out."

Ana agreed and headed towards the back door, though she still didn't like the idea of being on her own in that house.

She was on her way when someone came in through the door that led to the garden, looking like he had just been smoking outside. Ana hadn't met him yet. He seemed half white, half African at least, especially because of his clear eyes and his dark skin. There was something else she had noticed, and it was the fact that he looked as though he had been splattered with blood.

"Hello" he said when he saw Ana, and some smoke escaped his lips.

"Oh, my God, are you alright?" Ana asked, looking at his stained hands and shirt covered in red.

"Oh, you mean this?" he held up his two hands. "Yeah, it's just paint. Been covering Joburg in it, spreading the love" he winked.

"Uh…"

"Ah, we haven't met, I'm Tau" he said, taking her hand in his. "But everyone calls me Raddy. Don't worry, the paint is dry."

"Raddy?"

"Comes from 'radical'. That's what they think I am, heh."

"Oh, uh… I'm Ana."

"Nice to meet you, Ana" he said and finally let go of her hand. "You new?"

"Yeah, today was my first day."

"That's great! How was it? Meet the guys?"

"Yes, everybody was very nice."

"Yeah, they're excellent people, excellent people."

"Are you into graffiti?"

"How'd you guess?" he laughed. "Yes, I do try to make our message clear to the humans in Joburg. The guys at PoHA don't approve much, but I stay at it."

Just then Rineke appeared through the door.

"Hello, Tau."

"Rineke" Raddy replied politely.

There was something in the way Rineke looked at Raddy that made Ana think they really didn't like each other much. Or at least that Rineke didn't like Raddy. He didn't seem to take much pleasure in seeing him covered in red paint.

"We'll talk later" he said coldly.

"Right" Raddy replied with an innocent smile and Rineke gently pushed Ana out of the back door.

"Is everything OK?" Ana asked in the most discreet way she could manage.

"Ah…" he sighed. "He's just been in some trouble with the police."

"Ooh…"

"Nothing much this time, just graffiti. Someday he's going to get us all imprisoned."

Ana didn't say anything. Rineke seemed a bit tense and she didn't want to appear nosy, though she was in a way worried that it might be serious. Tau had seemed like a nice guy. A little strange, maybe, but nice.

"Don't get me wrong, Tau has done some wonderful things for the Poleepkwa" Rineke said, once again as though he knew what she was thinking. Was she really that obvious? "He has a deep passion for their race, he's known them longer than any of us and, in a way, feels indentified. The only problem is he might be making it worse for them and he thinks he's setting them free, you know what I mean?"

"Yeah…"

"Well, let's not make it spoil the fun. Did you have a good time?"

"Uh, yes, they were all very nice to me."

"I'm glad. Hmm, I'll go bring the car up, you can wait here if you like."

"Oh… OK…" she said, not really knowing why he would leave her behind for such a thing. But then, just as he was going out the fence door, someone poked her shoulder and she turned around in a reflex. Her heartbeat accelerated and kept the speed up when she saw who it was.

Kyler was standing before her leaning on a crutch with his eyes very close to her own, as if he wanted to see her retinas from up close. His wounded foot was held above the ground and wore the same legwarmer she had seen him put on the other day.

"Oh, it's you!" Ana said in relief. "I was wondering when you would be showing up."

"*They said you were coming."

Ana paused. She hated not to understand and made a note to herself to have a look at that Poleepkwan course online. Then she noticed the white paint on Kyler's head labeling him as 'property of MNU' and had a sudden feeling of guilt which she tried to ignore.

"So how's your leg?"

" 'Ahün."

"Good? Wait, say it again."

" 'Ahün."

"Does that mean good?" she tried.

"Za'ih."

"I guessed it" Ana said and smiled.

Then Kyler held something out to her in his prawn claw and she looked at it closely. It was some kind of collar, but it looked like it was made from pieces of machinery, silver and bronze.

"*I made this" he clicked.

"For me?"

He nodded. Ana took the collar and realized something.

"This is made from that alarm clock I gave you!"

"Za'ih."

"Wow, it's… very pretty" she said, though she still needed some getting used to the steampunk approach. It was SO not her style.

Kyler clicked something and she looked up at him to see him touch a necklace that hung from his neck. It felt very strange to see the broken face of her old clock decorating his chest. The piece had a half-moon shape and a few other smaller pieces of the mechanism tied around it. If she could look over the fact that it was really made from garbage, the result was rather pleasant.

Then she remembered what Rineke had told her over the phone, that Kyler wore things that the people important to him had given him, and she immediately felt a deep fondness for her new alien friend.

Without another moment's hesitation, she pulled the collar over her head and let it hang from her neck, looking proud. This made Kyler noticeably happy.

"You need help with that?" she asked, pointing at the bag that hanged from one of his shoulders. Kyler looked at it and showed her the palm of his hand, saying there was no need. He stuck his hand inside the bag and got out a book while clicking a short speech, probably explaining what it was for. Ana managed to get an idea when he pointed towards the house.

"Did you borrow it?"

He nodded.

"And now you're returning it, right? Can I see?"

Kyler handed her the book. It was 'Where the wild things are' by Maurice Sendak. She had heard of it, but never read it. Opening it she saw the extreme simplicity of the format. It was a very short tale, but meticulously illustrated. It was perfect for a beginner reader.

"How's your reading?" she asked, giggling inside.

Kyler only shrugged.

"Can you understand these?" she signaled towards the printing in the pages.

"Za'ih…"

"Maybe someday I can actually understand what you're telling me and we don't have to communicate through positive and negative answers, eh?"

Then the limping Poleepkwa appeared to remember something and pulled another object out of his bag: a notebook.

"Good idea. Did you get it from a PoHA member?"

"Amelia."

"Amelia, I got that!" she said feeling thrilled for having understood the gargles and clicks. "I'm getting better at it."

The fence door opened and Rineke appeared through it.

"So shall we go?"

Ana hesitated. She felt like she had just started something and it felt wrong to leave it there. Nevertheless she replied "Yes, coming" and she faced Kyler.

"This is my ride."

Kyler opened his notebook, which was still completely blank, and began to write. Ana waited until he was done writing in his child-like manner and looked at the words.

_See you soon?_

"Of course" she replied. "See you soon."

Rineke opened up the door for her and waved to Kyler.

"Later, Ky."

The door closed with a small thud and Ana and Rineke got in the car, both knowing this wouldn't be the last time she visited that wooden fence with the black hand painted on it.


	6. Chapter 6

**Breaking the habit**

The clockwork collar still looked strange on Ana, as Ana's friends made a point to indicate. She hadn't taken it off much lately, except for sleeping, for example, and that implied having her mates at the university see it hanging from her neck.

"What the heck is that, Ana?" Gery laughed, signaling towards the dangling pieces of clockwork and needles. "Is it like steampunk, or something?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"It really doesn't match your colors."

"Where did you get that?"

"A friend gave it to me."

"Ooh, a friend!" Sean sung. "New friend?"

"Yeah, it's… it was something silly that he made and… I think he just wanted to get rid of it. I don't really know him that well, actually."

"Ana's having no trouble getting over Keith" they joked.

What everybody said about Kyler's gift was usually not at all flattering, and so after a few days she stopped wearing it to class. They were right, after all. The bronze and copper colors didn't, by any means, match her usual dressing style. She liked blue, she liked silver and anything pastel. She had nothing in her wardrobe to suit the necklace's coloring, except maybe black, though she didn't have much of it and she definitely did not want to have to start dressing like Amelia. It was just… well, not normal. It wasn't her.

So although she kept wearing the necklace to all the PoHA meetings, which she attended every free Sunday, the rest of the week it was put away safely inside a jewel case out of everybody else's sight.

That day was PoHA day and Ana was on her way to Glenda's through the somewhat uncared for neighborhood in the outskirts. Rineke no longer came to pick her up at her house, which she understood. She couldn't depend on someone making things that much easier for her. If Poleepkwa didn't have that, then why should she? She would take the minibus every Sunday like all of them and then walk another few minutes towards the outskirts of the city where Glenda lived, and she didn't feel all too bad about it. It made her feel somehow independent. Long gone were the days when she followed all her friends around like a puppy. Only now she realized how tired she was of having to depend.

Today, however, Syrup offered to drive her to wherever it was she was mysteriously disappearing to, since it was her day off. Ana gratefully agreed, but did not tell her where she was going. Syrup dropped her off a few squares from Glenda's house and Ana walked the rest of the way.

She didn't know why she still hadn't told Syrup about her new friends. She guessed she just didn't trust her roommate with such a huge thing. What if she told somebody?

Her train of thought was suddenly interrupted when a voice called her name in the silent alley.

"Hey, Ana!"

It was Tau, or Raddy, like everybody called him. Ana turned to receive him and he approached her with a gentle smile. His clothes were once again covered in paint.

"I was on my way to Glenda's as well" he said. "But it felt wrong not to do my job even on my day off."

He pointed at one of the walls that belonged to a storage building of some sort. The paint spelled the words "MNU SPREADS LIES" in big red letters. Tau's jacket and backpack were lying on the ground.

"Oh yeah" she replied, not at all surprised.

In the short time that she had known the group, Raddy had always been affectionate and well mannered. Ana liked him, but he often made her uncomfortable by speaking of his "duties" as a revolutionary fighting for the Poleepkwa's rights. Maybe it was Rineke's influence on her, but noble though Raddy's intentions were, his methods still seemed a bit extreme for her taste. As soon as she remembered the things Raddy was accustomed to, he appeared too intimidating to have a normal conversation with. It struck Ana as a bit obsessive.

"Let me get my things."

Raddy grabbed his backpack and put on his jacket in order to cover the paint stains on his shirt and they kept walking together. The weather was chilly this time of year.

"I know what you're thinking" he noted with a smile.

"Oh?" Ana said, guessing what he was up to.

"You're thinking 'this guy is a vandal, this guy is crazy for doing what he does'. I know. Everybody thinks that."

Ana preferred not to comment.

"But anyway" Raddy said "how are things going? I hear you're adapting well. You must have fun with them, or you wouldn't come back at all, right?"

"I'm happy" Ana confessed "yes."

"Rineke says you and Kyler get along especially well."

"Well, he's the first Poleepkwa I met."

"And you saved his life" he added with a satisfied smile. "Yes, that could be the reason."

"I guess" she agreed, rather pleased with herself for having caused such a good impression on Tau. "Rineke does value you, you know?"

"So he says. He's a bit of an uncle for me, though lately I only seem to disappoint him. This is not to be spoken around, but he's taught me a lot. I was raised in the street, I'd probably be illiterate if it wasn't for him."

She nodded, impressed yet again with Rineke's generosity, and wondered how he managed to find the time to help so many people at once.

"Rineke says you have a special fondness for Poleepkwa."

"I practically grew up with them."

Ana blinked in surprise.

"Really?"

"I'm a slumdog, just like them. So unlike all the people at PoHA who've lived nothing but lives of comfort, I alone know what it's like to be a prawn.

"And don't your pra- Poleepkwa friends help you with… that?" she pointed a thumb backwards at the storage building they had just left behind.

"I never do this with them, it would get them in real trouble."

"But you're doing it in their name, right? Wouldn't that qualify as getting them in trouble?"

Tau seemed a little annoyed by this, but appeared to be expecting something of the sort.

"It shouldn't cause them any trouble if no humans have seen them actually doing it, they can't give the name or an appearance of a prawn, so even if they thought it was prawns doing this, they couldn't point out a suspect. The Poleepkwa are my people, and someone needs to do something for them."

Ana couldn't resist to ask.

"Then why don't the Poleepkwa just fight for themselves?"

"There's something you have to understand about Poleepkwa, and that is their need for guidance. They're like a hive without a queen. They're completely lost here. They have no purpose but to survive right now, because nobody's there to lead them one way or the other. They will occasionally wreak havoc out of anger, or even boredom, but with no real end if you think about it. They need someone to look up to, they need someone to tell them what to fight for. This does not make them stupid" he added quickly, "this just shows what they've grown up getting used to. It's their upbringing, they're not guilty for it."

"So if you could free them, they would still be lost, wouldn't they?"

"Some people believe culture makes the person. We can educate them. We can teach them to think for themselves, and if this generation won't completely adapt, then the next can. But before we can do that, someone has to provoke chaos, to break with the present reality. Rineke doesn't believe in my methods, and neither do many of the guys, but they're too goody-goody to understand that violence is the only way to get noticed. Violence will set the Poleepkwa free, and eventually I will prove it."

And there it was once again. They sounded like such big truths in Raddy's words, but so did Rineke's words. All those confusing thoughts of Raddy's view on violence as a form of solving problems were still spinning in her head when they arrived in front of the painted black hand.

"Did you know I did that myself?" Tau commented signaling towards the hand in the fence.

"Cool" she replied.

Glenda received them warmly and let them in. She had been working in the kitchen, as usual.

"Josh is downstairs setting some things up. We're not having many people over today, what with Christmas around the corner" she explained as they followed her inside. The kitchen smelled heavenly. Kyler was there, apparently giving Glenda some company, and as soon as Ana saw him she went to stand next to him. Raddy greeted him as well with a friendly handshake.

"What's up, Man?"

"*Hey, Tau."

Then Raddy went downstairs to help Josh with his endeavors.

"How's your leg?" Ana asked Kyler, just like she did every Sunday.

Kyler bent over and lifted the bottom of his legwarmer to uncover the wound.

"What is that?" she said, looking at it closer.

"*A friend did it. It's plastic.

Indeed there was a piece of blue plastic replacing the missing chunk of exoskeleton and it seemed to be heavily glued to the surrounding shell.

"Wow. And how is it turning out?"

"*I can walk better. Look" Kyler paced up and down the kitchen, still leaning on his crutch, but now he was able to actually set his bad foot on the ground.

"That's great! This'll be a full recovery, I'm telling you."

Glenda turned her head from her place in front of the oven.

"Ana, dear, would you mind giving this a few stirs while I go for some plates?"

Ana took the wooden spoon from Glenda and Kyler limped after her towards the gas stove to watch.

"Could you pass me that cloth?"

She signaled towards the wall and Kyler reached out to grab it for her.

"Do you know Tau well?" she asked.

"*I just know him from the association" he said slowly so she could understand as much as possible. "*Why?"

"He said he practically grew up with Poleepkwa."

Kyler seemed to know a little of this, because he nodded.

"He's a very interesting guy" she commented.

Kyler agreed silently. All the things Raddy had said about the Poleepkwa stirred in her head like the liquid she was tending to. It didn't matter that Raddy had denied it, it still seemed pretty stupid to Ana not being able to lead your own life. Was Kyler like that? A sheep without a shepherd?

She hated herself afterwards for thinking that, especially after realizing she was accusing the Poleepkwa of something she was particularly guilty of; dependence.

"I've been studying your language" she commented, shoving the rest of her thoughts aside.

"*Yes, you understand more now he replied happily.

"I understood that too" she said hopping on her heals twice, so that she almost spilled some liquid. She was actually learning Alien. It turned out she was a fast learner when she put all her interest into something. And with the help of it happened to be easier than she had previously believed.

Something brushed against her shoulder and she turned her head. Kyler had been gently passing his finger down her hair but immediately retrieved it looking embarrassed.

"*Sorry."

Ana could only smile. "That's ok, it doesn't bother me."

"*Are you sure?"

Those words were still not in her vocabulary, but his expression translated for her.

"No, really, it's ok."

So Kyler's finger retook its course down Ana's hair and then pinched a strand and bended it to admire the reflections. She wanted to refrain from laughing, but his fascination was too cute.

"You like it?"

"*Yes" he replied distractedly. "*How does it feel?"

"I don't know what you just said."

Kyler shook his head. "*Never mind."

"I can teach you to make braids."

The Poleepkwa stared.

"You know what braids are?"

The tendrils dangled as he shook his head again.

"I'll show you later."

Just then a knock came from the back yard and Glenda made her reappearance from the hallway.

"Hold it a bit longer there, Ana, I'll be right back."

And after leaving the plastic plates on a table she hurried outside to receive the guests. In a matter of seconds, excitement filled the kitchen as the back door swung open to reveal a wounded Black Jack. Ana couldn't figure it out at first, because he was black and red all by himself, but the robust Poleepkwa was covered in blood and dirt and was being helped inside by Jasper. Kyler and Ana rushed to the door to try to be of some help.

"What happened?" asked Ana.

"The idiot got in a fight" snapped Glenda. "Again."

"*That asshole deserved it" Jack blurted out through his blood covered tendrils.

"And so did you, if you want my opinion, for getting yourself in such messes."

"Is this all his?" asked an anxious Ana in seeing all the red stuff Jack was covered in.

"Apparently" Glenda yelled in his face "it isn't!"

"*Part of it was the other guy's" Jasper noted. "*But this is his" he added pointing to a badly looking wound on Jack's side.

"MNU?" exclaimed Glenda and all of a sudden she seemed more worried than angry.

"*A guard was passing by and saw the fight, and apparently thought shooting at them would help."

"*It's nothing!" protested Jack.

"Like hell it isn't, we have to get you cleaned up to get a better look of that, come on."

"*Hey, hey, hey, what- where are you taking me?" Jack said, pulling in the opposite direction that Glenda was pulling him.

"We're gonna get you cleaned!"

"*I don't need it!"

"*Come on, Jack, it could be bad."

"*I'm telling you it's not, it didn't pierce the shell!"

"Did you get your finger in there to prove that? Ana, come with us, we'll need the help. Kyler, dear, with your leg like that you'll have to stay here. You can keep stirring that cream in the meantime, I'll be right down."

"*Should I warn the others?"

"I wouldn't worry about that, it'll only put more unnecessary stress on all of us. Let's go, BJ."

"*Why you? I can clean my own shell!"

"No, you can't, apparently, and you can't see your own wound properly either, stop being so whiny."

Ana followed the trio towards the bathroom in the most humble way she could manage, afraid of being a burden for Black Jack. He sure didn't want any of their help. Ana thought he was only partly obeying because he was too weak at the moment to put up much of a fight.

The other reason could be Glenda's attitude towards him. Ana wished she had half the character Glenda had as she watched how the energetic black woman bossed him around in a motherly kind of way to get him in the tub.

"Ana, go get some towels. They're over there, in that closet in the hallway."

Ana could hear Black Jacks protests from outside the bathroom. When she returned, Glenda was already showering water on Black Jack.

"Good Lord, do you ever bathe? Glenda said.

"*We don't have such fancy things as bathtubs."

"Like you'd use it if you had it. You have the community baths. May I remind you you're supposed to bathe once every two weeks by law?" Glenda said.

"*Nobody ever does!"

"*I do. Sometimes" Jasper said.

"*What's in it for you! What do you humans want from me!"

"Black Jack, I want you to stay still for a minute! You're a soldier, act your age!"

"*Ex-soldier!"

With one of the towels Ana had brought, Glenda started cleansing the wound softly with a bit of soap. Black Jack kept protesting, Ana thought, more out of annoyance than pain.

"Ok, it doesn't look so bad."

"*The soap stings!"

"It's pretty superficial, nothing serious."

"*I told you that already."

Black Jack gave a small squeal and his pointed fingers tore the towel a couple of holes.

"Aw, jeez, BJ, will you just stop moving, we're almost finished!" Glenda scolded him by hitting him in the shoulder with the broken towel.

Together they helped Black Jack out of the tub. Glenda told him to sit somewhere and she rushed out of the bathroom. Jack sat on the edge of the bathtub looking a little tired.

"Jasper, help me over here a sec, will you? I can't reach."

Jasper left to help Glenda, leaving Ana alone with Black Jack, who seemed to be thinking the same as Ana as he watched her in silence. Ana lowered her eyes timidly. Jack still raised a feeling of unease in her.

"So" she began "you're a soldier."

"*Ex-soldier."

"No wonder you're so…" Ana was quiet for a few seconds after seeing the look on Jack's eyes. "Tough."

"*I could probably kill you with a flick of my finger. Yes" he replied and Ana thought to pick up a hint of pride for what she had said.

That's why she had to ask "So if you had the chance would you have revenge on mankind? Would you bring your army here and destroy us all?"

Black Jack glared at her through the corner of his eyes.

"*You don't want that question answered."

Ana understood enough of that sentence to feel somewhat depressed.

"We're really just trying to be of help. I don't think Glenda wants anything from you."

The soldier was quiet for a couple of seconds.

"*I wouldn't destroy you guys."

Ana smiled faintly.

"*That's a start."

Just then Glenda and Jasper returned carrying a roll of bandage, which Black Jack roundly rejected. After a few more tries and a few more complaints, Jack won the battle for once.

"*I said no!"

"Tisk, fine! You win, BJ, no bandages!" cried Glenda throwing the roll in the sink.

When they got downstairs to the basement, the few people that had made it today were watching Gargoyles on the TV. Meanwhile, Josh was handling some cables and Saskia was curiously examining a microphone under Sam's and Jen's watchful eyes. Ana still wasn't used to the idea of them being a couple, but they were all pretty easy going with that. Nobody scolded Ana for being especially quiet near them in the beginning, and slowly she began to feel more comfortable, though she was always reminded of their relationship the instant she saw them together. Lately she was trying extra hard to put that behind her.

It was interesting to see how when Black Jack showed up, he and Raddy shook hands in a more than polite manner. The handshake reminded her of African-American gangster movies. There was complicity there, even Ana could tell. It was almost as if Black Jack actually respected the human, like he saw him as an equal.

They said Rineke wouldn't be coming that day, and neither would Neil, or Fanny, or even Amelia. As for Eleanor, she rarely came over to hang out with them. It was hard for her being among so many people, but Glenda proudly assured them the striped Poleepkwa did stop by once in a while to see her, when nobody else was in the house.

"Karaoke?" Ana asked Kyler in disbelief with a hint of hilarity when she saw what the microphone was for.

"*Yes, apparently."

"But" she giggled "can you sing?"

Kyler shrugged.

"*We can try."

There were certainly attempts, though none were taken seriously. Most of the time the Poleepkwa were too fascinated by their amplified voices coming from the speakers to even try to follow the song, and soon the room was filled with especially loud, amused gargles. Even Black Jack contributed to the noise, once he'd recover with the help of some water and food from Glenda's fridge. It almost felt wrong to actually sing when it was the humans' turn.

Ana could not remember having so much fun in years.

The curfew approached and everybody made to leave.

"Are we celebrating Christmas, then?" Ana asked Glenda before going out the back door.

"Oh, no, dear, we don't celebrate Christmas. That's a Christian tradition, it would be pretty ironic if we made Poleepkwa celebrate it."

"Not even for the presents?"

"No, you know how this is, a Poleepkwa could never buy a present. Giving them presents could bring uncomfortable situations, even if we tell them they don't need to repay us. It's a very shallow thing anyway."

"You're right" Ana agreed, though she couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed. Christmas with a bunch of aliens should've been a blast. But she said goodbye and didn't insist on the subject.

She and a few others walked towards the District 9 gates together until they came across the first minibus stop, and humans and Poleepkwa separated, each heading for very different destinies.


	7. Chapter 7

**Tale as old as time**

"Ugh!" Ana exclaimed after seeing herself in the mirror. The collar looked especially out of place over her sky blue shirt, and she took it off with a smirk to go and put it away until she would use it again for going to PoHA.

On her way to her bedroom she crossed paths with Syrup, who was having a day off, like her, for the holidays and looked more awake than she had ever known her. Ana did all that she could to hide the collar from her roommate, but she reacted too late.

"What is that!" Syrup snapped, stopping dead and making her slippers squeak in the floor.

"Oh, just a piece of junk that I…"

"Wow, where'd you get that? It's real pretty!" Syrup said.

Ana had to double check to make sure she had heard fine. Syrup was the first non-PoHA person that had told her this.

"You think so?"

"Yeah, did you make it?" Syrup took the collar and turned it around in her fingers.

"No, not me."

"Who gave it to you?"

Ana hesitated.

"Just a friend."

Then something occurred to her.

"Say, Syrup, you wouldn't happen to have some clothing that could go well with this, right?"

"Lemme see."

That day Ana wore Kyler's gift proudly over a moss green sweater. After that, Syrup gained a place in Ana's soul, so she only wished they could hang out together more, and oftentimes she wondered what her reaction would be if she ever told her about the Poleepkwa.

Christmas time for the Poleepkwa was just like other times, only warmer. They only got Christmas Eve and Christmas Day off because all their bosses were gone. So until that day, which sadly Ana would spend with their parents at her home town, Kyler and the rest of the Poleepkwa still had to work.

Soon Ana would leave Johannesburg for the holidays and chances were the association wouldn't meet at all that Sunday, which was a real bummer. Ana had nothing to do but to stay at home and study, since she barely went out with her old friends anymore, so much so that they sometimes asked her about her new friends that she now liked so much better than them. Ana couldn't blame them for hating her, after all she had ditched them shamefully for no apparent reason. But strange though it was, Ana did not feel at home anymore among them. They seemed a thing of the past, and even their trivial conversations about the latest pop star appeared dull and uninteresting. Ana was hanging out with aliens, what did she care for some new cheesy pop singer and his love life?

Something caught her eye on her way home from downtown Johannesburg, where she had been shopping restlessly for Christmas presents.

Inside a bookstore's display was a new edition of "Where the wild things are". Ana took her hand to her neck and played with the collar's pendants, considering the situation.

Glenda had said not to give presents to the Poleepkwa because they could feel the need to repay the favor. Either that or just take advantage of your hospitality. In any case, Ana thought, she sort of owed Kyler for the collar, even though it was made from pieces of her own clock.

She had a look at her watch. It was quarter to eight. If she hurried up maybe she could catch Kyler at the district's gates before he got there from work.

So she bought the book, but didn't wrap it up -somehow that seemed a tad superficial and rather worthless- and headed for District 9.

She had never actually been so close to the gates. It was pretty intimidating. Every now and then a MNU car was let in and in the few seconds that the gates stayed open, Ana could see inside the district, feeling worse every time she did.

A slum. Litter everywhere, Poleepkwa scavenging for food, or fighting for it, like animals. It was hard to think of Kyler, and Jasper, and Sam, and all of the others as belonging to the same race as those insectoid hyenas.

In the time that she was waiting for Kyler's bus, other unknown Poleepkwa came and went, and some stopped to look at her, perhaps wondering what the hell would a puny human female like her be doing there at those hours. There were times when Ana thought she was actually in danger.

So when the bus from the mines arrived at last, she ran towards it with renewed hope. Kyler was already stepping out and heading for the gates with his bag over his shoulder and limping on his crutch.

"Ky!" she called out before he could get away any further.

Kyler looked around in confusion, thinking he had heard someone call his name. His nickname. When he saw Ana, he still looked confused, like he was seeing things. But by the time she had reached him he already seemed happy to see her.

He had been walking with another Poleepkwa, who was blatantly staring at her through untrusting eyes. Kyler told him to keep going so he and Ana could talk.

" _What are you doing here_?" he said gleefully.

"I was leaving tomorrow, so I thought I'd stop by and… you know."

"_Leaving_?" Kyler repeated with a hint of fear.

"Only for the holidays. But here" she said, taking out the book from inside the bag and handing it out to him. "Happy holidays."

Kyler watched the book in disbelief, like he wondered why Ana had brought him Glenda's book.

"Come on, take it, it's for you" Ana needed to clarify.

The Poleepkwa kept looking back and forth to both Ana and the book before actually taking it from her hand.

" _For me_?" he repeated yet once again, apparently unable to comprehend what the real deal was. " _Did you buy this for me_?"

"What was that word?"

" _Buy_?"

"Yeah."

" _Get something for money_."

Ana nodded.

"I bought it" she said proudly. "I knew how much you liked it, Glenda says you've borrowed it several times. So now you won't have to!"

There was a short silence in which Kyler only stared at the book. Then he looked up and mumbled "_Thank you_."

She nodded again in acknowledgement.

"But don't think you need to repay me, please. It's a gift. I got this because I can afford it, so please don't try to return the favor."

Kyler hesitated.

"Ok?"

"_Ok…_"

Ana smiled at the Poleepkwa pronunciation.

"It's too bad we can't read it now, though. It's almost nine."

Kyler was thoughtful for a moment, and then started looking around so that Ana began to feel nervous. After that, he shoved the book inside his bad, grabbed Ana's hand and pulled her out of the road. They kept going, Kyler limping hurriedly, until they were out of the guards' sight, then turned a corner of the wall and continued walking.

"Kyler, where are we going?" Ana asked in anguish. He only gave her a significant look for lack of free hands, which she understood as "be quiet".

After a couple of minutes of limping, finally Kyler brought them both to a halt. They were standing in a deserted area of the outskirts, covered in tall grass. The cement wall was gone and now there was only a metal fence which separated them from the inside of District 9. Ana noticed an opening in the metal plate.

"Are we going in there?" she asked agitatedly.

" _No, no, you can't_" Kyler said, making plain that it was absolutely out of the question. However, he now seemed at ease and had no trouble speaking out loud, so she took it like it was a safe place. "_Now we can read_" he said happily, taking out the book.

Ana laughed out of relief.

"Is that what this was all about?"

Kyler seemed amused by her laugh.

"But it's nine o'clock! Aren't you supposed to be in there?"

He huffed loudly.

"_ I can risk it for tonight_."

Ana did not understand all of the words, but who needed to, with those two big round eyes looking so cheerfully at her? They both sat down against the fence and opened the book.

"I think I could learn a thing or two if you read this in Poleepkwa" she suggested and Kyler agreed, so very slowly he passed the tip of his finger along the writing, hearing the sounds in his head, and then translated to Poleepkwa. It was an arduous task, but well worth it. Many times, Ana also had to tell Kyler the meaning of a word, and then Kyler would say that word in Poleepkwa. Occasionally now, she even attempted speaking it. Didn't go so bad, considering Kyler didn't laugh at her as much as she did herself.

"It's those muted clicks!" she protested.

Kyler instructed her.

" 'A" he kept repeating " 'A, 'a."

"Kah?"

He puffed in amusement.

"_Not_ kah. 'A."

"Kah! Gka! I sound like a drunken bird."

Time flew and they had only reached the half of the book. That called for a rest. Ana's throat felt dry from all the clicking. So they just sat there for a few more minutes before each having to definitely go to their respective places. Looking at her watch, she noted almost an hour and a half had passed, which made her a little uneasy.

"Aren't you worried they might catch you?"

"_I've been out late before_" he shrugged, then turned his head forward. That's when Ana saw the white paint on his head. She rarely got to see it up close, him being so much taller than her, but every time she saw it she felt unbearably guilty.

She turned to see beyond the opening in the metal fence, which hopefully hid them well enough. Inside the district, a group of Poleepkwa was sharing a fire, sitting around it, and every one of them had that white paint on their heads. The night was strangely at peace, even on that side of the fence.

"What do you think of humans?" she asked Kyler.

He faced her, a surprised expression in his eyes.

" _What do I think_?"

"I mean… we do all these awful things to you. We stuff you in there…" she pointed a thumb behind her back, to the fence, "we paint those things on your heads… we kill you sometimes."

Kyler listened in silence.

"We neglect you. And then we blame you for doing things that… now seem logical to me. So how do you feel about humans?" she repeated, knowing what the obvious answer would be, and feeling miserable for it.

The Poleepkwa frowned at her and seemed at a loss for words Ana could understand.

"_Some humans do those things_" he said finally " _but you don't_."

He seemed so certain. He almost convinced her.

"I've neglected you too. For a long time."

Kyler shook his head, smiling in his Poleepkwa way, and grabbed "Where the wild things are" and shook it in the air in front of her.

"_ I don't care_" he said simply.

What Ana did next was completely irrational, illogical and impulsive as she saw it. She hugged him. She leaned her head on his shoulder plates and embraced his chest with her arm. How else could she have replied to that? It felt like hugging a big, spiky piece of wood. And she almost flinched when she felt the chunks of shell on Kyler's sides move with his lungs. She got the strange feeling she was obstructing his breathing.

Luckily, though, he hugged back without a hint of a doubt, so that she didn't have time to retrieve.

The very next morning Ana was packing her bags when someone knocked on their door. The bags were full of her pastel colored tops. She was hoping to find different colors in her old wardrobe at home, maybe dig up a few things she never wore fearful of her friends' opinions. It was about time she got herself a new look.

The knocking repeated itself.

"Syrup, you gonna get that?" she yelled, but no answer came. Then Ana heard Keith's voice coming from outside.

"Ana?"

She wondered what he would be doing there, she hadn't seen him in ages, and now he comes looking for her at her doorstep? "This should be interesting" she thought, making sure the collar that Kyler gave her was well visible on her neck and running to get the door.

And there was Keith, looking like he'd never broken a vase in his life.

"Hi" he said with the dreamiest voice.

"Hello" Ana said simply.

She noticed Keith's eyes stopped for a moment on Ana's neck.

"How's everything?" he continued.

"Great! How are you?"

"Good, well… I've missed you."

"Really?"

"Ohh, you have no idea, baby."

"So what brings you here?"

"Well, see, I was gonna go home for the holidays, but then I thought of you and… well, I thought you'd like to go have some coffee, or something."

"No, thanks."

Keith looked somewhat stunned by her direct response.

"Maybe some other time?" he tried.

"No" Ana said. "You can forget about me, Keith. I've… moved on."

Now Keith looked a little less docile. He sighed a couple of times and then asked "So who's the lucky guy?"

"No one, I just don't want to be with you anymore."

"Why the hell not? Everything was great when you were with me. You even dressed better."

That did it. Ana waited a few seconds before allowing a malicious smile to slowly form in her lips, the last smile he would ever get from her.

"Fuck you" she said as calmly and sweetly as if she were speaking to a toddler and then slammed the door in Keith's face before walking away from the door feeling strangely euphoric.

She realized Syrup had, at some point, come out to watch, and now she was standing there with amazement and reverence. Keith's voice could still be heard faintly along with the continued knocking.

"Ana, I'm really sorry. Come on, I didn't mean that, I've been a jerk!"

Surprisingly, without warning, Syrup stepped up to the door, opened it, growled "she said fuck you!" and slammed it again. Ana stared as Syrup turned on her heels to face her.

"That was inspiring" she sighed.


	8. Chapter 8

Hallo! I want to thank you guys for the nice reviews^^ I usually like to thank people personally but I can't always do that on this site. So a general hug will have to do.

And as long as I'm commenting, I suppose some of you may have realised that most of the chapter titles are inspired by things such as songs or geeky quotes. See if you can guess them all :D

I'll try to post more soon. Hope you all enjoy it. Cheerio!

**Prayer of the refugee**

"Love what you've done with your hair, Syrup."

Syrup clicked her tongue and stroked the top of her head narcissistically.

"Yeah, it was about time, huh? Everybody was thinking it too. Blue was way too artificial. Purple's much more natural."

"You're right" Ana agreed amusingly, stirring her coffee so as to distract herself from the urge to giggle. Laughing in Syrup's face would probably never bother Syrup, but just in case…

They had decided to have breakfast at a cheap pub after they'd realized they had no power at home for the third time that month. Syrup and Ana ate together more often now that Syrup had taken up another job that didn't require her having to spend the nights out. She looked much healthier in her new purple hair than she had in a long time.

"So what of your friends, then? You're still seeing them?" Syrup asked casually, referring to the Poleepkwa and the people at PoHA, though she didn't know it.

"Yeah, I see them almost every Sunday."

"You're so mysterious, Ana. You have a secret gang and everything."

"Not a gang. It's an association."

" I wonder when you'll let me meet them."

"Maybe someday. I'll have to ask them, they're very picky about who enters the association."

"Yeah, yeah" Syrup flapped her hand at her and took a sip from her Mocha. "Meanwhile you keep confiding in me all this soap opera going on in there."

Ana smiled. She had been telling Syrup about her friends for some time now. Syrup knew all their names, but couldn't imagine that many of those names did not belong to humans. She really did wonder everyday what would happen if she told Syrup the truth, but she couldn't make up her mind. Maybe she was too afraid of losing them.

"Nothing new, really" she commented. "Well, Black Jack's taken up patrolling."

"Oh, yeah, you told me. How's he doing with that"

"He seems happy. At least he gets to do something rather than just sit around watching TV. I just hope he doesn't get out of hand if they do come across something. Like if there's someone to defend. I think Jack would get overexcited."

Syrup nodded like she knew exactly what Black Jack would do. Then she lifted her head from her breakfast and stared at her confidently.

"How about Kyler?" she whispered.

"What about him?" Ana replied, thinking she knew where Syrup was going. It wasn't the first time she had come up with this.

"Come on, I know you guys like each other."

Ana inhaled patiently and rolled her eyes so that Syrup could see.

"This must be the thirtieth time I tell you. There is nothing between Kyler and me, there CAN'T be."

"Why NOT?" Syrup protested.

"If you knew him you'd understand" Ana said dismissively, taking another sip from her cup.

"He's not gay, right?"

Ana chuckled "No, he can't technically be gay either."

"Well, I'm still waiting to meet him. That way I can find out what's so wrong about him."

"Right. So what time you getting out of work today?" she asked quickly in order to change the topic.

"Ugh, I'm stuck inside that gas station until six with "Merry Bob". Let's see what the idiot comes up with today…" Syrup complained pretending to be angry. It seemed Syrup was incapable of feeling anger. Only of simulating it.

Syrup kept talking, but at some point Ana stopped hearing, for there was something else that was catching her eye at the other side of the pub's windows.

Just across the street from them, two policemen had stopped a poleepkwa in its path and now seemed to be questioning it. The poleepkwa faced the two policemen looking nervous. Now that she looked at it, that poleepkwa had a certain feminineness about it. After all these months, Ana could actually tell when a poleepkwa's human name was female. The poleepkwa was bluish green and wore black pants and a yellow trench coat with a sleeve torn off. She was carrying a black trash-bag which now was being emptied by one of the men in uniform, all its content spread on the ground.

This was not at all unusual, though what really bothered Ana was that she couldn't see a reason for it this time. Her doubts were cleared when all three of them moved over a little and Ana could see what was surely the cause of all the commotion: in the wall behind them there were big letters in red saying D10 CONCENTRATION CAMP. The first set of three characters meant nothing to Ana, but the style was unmistakable. It was one of Raddy's graffiti.

"…does the worst W.C. Fields imitation I've ever heard…" Syrup went on in the background.

But Ana's attention was still on the poleepkwa in distress. The policemen were clearly accusing her of painting that graffiti and were still looking through her things. The poleepkwa opened up her coat to show them she wasn't hiding anything, especially not a spray can, and revealed a bandage-covered torso. It must have been for decoration, because she didn't look wounded at all.

Ana felt she should do something before they took her away, but what? She would expose herself as sympathizer of the prawns. Not illegal, but still worth suspicion. And she didn't want to expose PoHA either.

"Anyway, I gotta go" Syrup finished suddenly, getting up from her chair. "Work."

Ana stuttered, not taking her eyes off the poleepkwa in trouble.

"I should go too" she said distractedly, getting up as well.

"You coming to the minibus?"

"No, going this way."

She and Syrup went outside. The poleepkwa's concerned gargles were now slightly audible, though Syrup didn't seem to notice.

"By the way, I found this sticker for Jasper's collection. Think he'll like it?"

Ana turned to face Syrup, trying to concentrate on what she was telling her.

"Oh, hey, thank you!" she exclaimed, taking the big round sticker from Syrup. "He'll love it. I'll tell him it's from you-"

"Really? So can I meet them already?"

"D- err- I'll think about it, but I gotta go now, bye!"

"Bye, Ana!" Syrup sang happily and practically skipped away down the street.

Ana turned the corner and waited until her roommate was out of sight. She knew she would never be able to convince the police, or prove, for that matter, that the prawn hadn't painted that on the wall. She had learned how unnecessary evidence was to arrest a prawn. It was enough that someone believed the alien was guilty.

She noticed a police car parked down the street from where she was standing and made up her mind. Thinking fast, or rather not thinking at all, she picked up a brick from an abandoned building and, after making sure there was no one around, threw it at the car's windshield. The alarm went off immediately and Ana ran. She didn't run away, though, but back round the same corner from whence she came, towards the police agents.

Before she had reached the corner, one of the agents appeared behind it looking agitated and sweaty.

"It IS our car!" he screamed behind him, no doubt at his mate, who still had the poleepkwa pinned against the red letters. "Miss! Miss, who did it? Did you see it?" the first asked Ana. She did her best to appear frightened, which was not very difficult considering she had never defied the police like this before.

"Uh, yeah, it was a poleep- one of those prawns, it ran off that way…"

"Leave that one, come on!" the policeman closest to Ana said before she could finish. "We'll catch that filthy bastard!"

The other one spat at the alien "you stay here or you're in serious trouble, you hear?" and the two men hurried off leaving Ana and the alien behind.

Ana was still shaky when she decided to step up to the poleepkwa with the yellow trench coat, who was now hastily gathering all her things from the ground and stuffing them back inside the plastic bag. She stopped the moment she saw Ana's shadow and looked up to her in fear, her antennae twitching nervously.

" _I didn't do that_! " she stated quickly, signaling towards the red paint behind her.

"I know" Ana replied, looking around anxiously. A couple of people had stopped walking to take a look at the human who was actually socializing with a prawn. "Have you given them your name?"

" _What_? "

"Do they" Ana pointed at the policemen "know your name?"

" _No, they didn't ask me… Wait, you understand me_? "

"Yeah, most of the time. I'm getting there. Well, come on, we'd better get out of here before they come back."

The alien watched doubtfully for a few seconds as Ana started helping her gather her things.

"Come on!" Ana insisted. Her hands could barely hold objects from the tension. Finally the alien reacted and they both finished picking everything up from the ground.

" _Did you set off that alarm_ ?" the poleepkwa asked.

"Yeah" Ana breathed, getting on her feet and pulling on the poleepkwa's arm until she would follow on her own accord. They jogged until they were well out of sight and entered a small park area.

"Uh… well, those people over there are watching us, but what the hell" Ana commented, trying to ignore the staring faces. "Anyway, hi, I'm Ana" she said holding out her hand.

The poleepkwa looked at Ana's hand uncertainly, like she wasn't sure about what she was supposed to do. A few seconds later, though, she took it and they shook.

"_ I'm _Crystal. "

Ana smiled inside for having guessed the gender of her name. Now that all was calmer she noticed the bracelets on the alien's wrist and the beads in her antennae. Strangely whimsical for a prawn, she thought.

"This is the first time I save a poleepkwa" Ana giggled timidly. Crystal raised her head at the mention of the word poleepkwa, which seemed to quite please her though she didn't seem to know what to say. "Well, not really my first" Ana added after remembering about Kyler. Somehow that seemed so far away she had forgotten about it. "It's really the first time I've saved a poleepkwa voluntarily" she chuckled.

Crystal emitted a soft gurgle for lack of a better response.

"I hope those cops didn't treat you very roughly."

Now Crystal lowered her head, sighing through the slits in her throat.

" _I can't even read. I told them, but I don't think they understood a word I was saying…_"

"Yeah, well, just remember to stay away from the red paintings from now on. And the cops. You might want to lose the yellow trench coat too."

"_ No, I couldn't_ " Crystal caressed her coat, shaking her head. "_ But how did you know I hadn't painted that on the wall?_ "

"Because I know the guy who did" Ana replied with a sigh. "Speaking of which, you might want to meet my friends…"

PoHA met the next Sunday. Ana went to the patrol's encounter after their round to head towards Glenda's house together. Kyler was with the patrol and greeted Ana with a squeeze that lifted her off her feet when he saw her. It always felt like a lot, but it was obvious Kyler was controlling his strength which, as a poleepkwa, was quite overwhelming. Once Ana was back on firm ground she greeted Kyler's newbie.

"Hi, Crystal."

Kyler had taken up sponsoring now that his leg was practically cured. There was still a slight limping to his walking, but at last he could do away with the crutch. It felt great seeing him this free after all this time that Ana had known him limited to a walking stick. Now he was finally standing tall on his two feet, lively and agile like she had never pictured him, and he had just agreed to becoming Crystal's guide on her first days at PoHA.

"Hi, people!"

Everybody greeted her back. Jasper, Amelia, Josh and Sam were there. Also Moeketsi, Kyler's human superior and friend from the mine. Ana had only seen him a few times. Moeketsi had a family to care for and could rarely make it to the meetings.

The troop was abnormally small today. A lot of people were missing for some reason. Nothing to be worried about, it happened sometimes. People had other things to do.

The group decided to stall for a short while before continuing their walk towards Glenda's.

"Jasper!"

" _What's up, Ana_. "

"Look" Ana took out the sticker that Syrup had given her and showed it to him. It had some kind of company logo imprinted on it, but it was shiny. Jasper took it like it was made of gold.

" _Thank you_! "

"It's from a friend, she got it for you."

" _A friend? From the association?_ "

"No, but I think she'd like to be."

"You've told her about us?" Amelia interjected, but didn't sound too alarmed.

"Sort of. She doesn't know about the Poleepkwa."

"And what do you think? You think she'd like the poleepkwa?"

Ana was thoughtful for a moment.

"I think she wouldn't mind… Actually she was the one who told me about prawnsarelove . com…"

There were a few snickers in reaction to the site's name.

"_Maybe you should bring her one day_ " Sam suggested.

"Yeah, maybe. Where's Rineke?"

"Don't know" Josh said. "He hasn't showed up in two weeks now."

" _I think something's been troubling him_ " Kyler said. " _He won't say what_. "

"There's a lot of people missing today."

" _Yeah I don't know what's up with that_ " Jasper added distractedly as he fixed the sticker onto his upper right arm. He had recently taken up collecting stickers to decorate his shell. It seems he got the idea from a neighbor of his. He looked like a typical traveler's suitcase.

"So what can we do today?" Josh said clapping his hands together.

" _Twister was fun_ " Kyler commented.

Just then, a loud huff caused everybody to turn around to look at Black Jack, who had just appeared out of nowhere. At first Ana thought he had laughed at Kyler's comment, but behind that proud, solemn aura of his he looked somewhat restless.

" _Something's going on at Glenda's_. "

Something was indeed going on at Glenda's. By the time they reached the house, the entire back yard was surrounded by poleepkwa of all sizes and colors, all chattering nervously and flickering their antennae in what looked like a sea of living twigs. There could easily be around forty poleepkwa standing just outside Glenda's fence. But what worried Ana the most were the few human neighbors and passer-bys that stood watching from a safe distance.

"What happened?" Ana asked worriedly, grabbing Kyler's arm as they got closer to the entrance. Kyler did not respond.

A human voice yelled among the chattering.

"Please, just go to your homes and we'll send someone to inform you as soon as we know anything!"

It was Rineke, who was trying to induce some order with little or no results.

The poleepkwa pushed each other closer to Rineke, desperately trying to be heard above the others.

"We'll do everything we can, but please, right now I need you to GO!"

"All of you, come inside" said another voice near them. Glenda had made her way through the crowd towards the group of friends and now was indicating them to follow her.

" _Through the front door?_" Kyler asked.

"There's already a horde of prawns around my back yard. A few of you entering through my front door will be hardly noticed. Come on" Glenda said, holding the door open for them as they went inside one by one. "You're the new one, right?" she asked Crystal with a sweet smile just like she would any other normal occasion. "Welcome, dear, make yourself at home."

They all headed for the sitting room with the same feelings of confusion and uneasiness.

Tau was already there, looking horribly stressed out, angry and miserable, his right leg crossed over his left vibrating violently. Jen was there too with Saskia, and they both greeted Sam with a couple of hugs.

As soon as they were all in the room, Rineke made his appearance through the back door, slamming it behind him. Suddenly the room was filled with loud clicks and questions.

"Please, guys, not you too, let me explain" he pleaded stroking his temple and the noise faded slowly to a suspenseful silence.

"I'm guessing none of you has heard anything."

"About what?" Amelia frowned.

" _What happened_? " inquired Sam.

Rineke raised one hand requesting silence.

"MNU has just started a massive eviction. They announced it today on the news, and poleepkwa who had a human friend found out and the word spread like fire. There are poleepkwa back there I've never seen in my life. They're moving the entire non-human population from District 9, to demolish it."

" _Moving? To where_? " Sam said.

"They've built a new settlement for the Poleepkwa some two hundred kilometers from Johannesburg."

" _What_? " Jasper gargled, clicking his mandibles excitedly.

"They can't do that!" Jen exclaimed, remaining close to Sam.

"Apparently they can. It's all set. All they have to do is get every poleepkwa to sign the eviction notices. "

" _What if we refuse_? " Kyler suggested.

"I don't think you want to do that. It's best not to resist. There's already been one poleepkwa casualty that we know of."

"Who? " Amelia demanded.

Rineke shook his head.

"No one we knew."

"_ Why didn't you tell us before? You've known about this for days_ " Black Jack asked, undoubtedly annoyed.

"Not just days. Neil gave me the information weeks ago, but we agreed that you didn't need to know yet, especially since MNU didn't want you to."

"Since when do we care what MNU says?" Josh exclaimed.

"You're forgetting our policies. We don't break the law, it's the whole point of PoHA. We've done all this" Rineke made a movement of his hand to embrace everyone in the room "staying within legal boundaries. We don't need confrontations with MNU."

Rineke peered at Tau through the corner of his eye. Tau only sneered.

Jen was on the verge of tears.

"So when were you planning on telling us then?" she whimpered.

"You'd find out on your own in due time. And here it is."

"That's a very serious lack of trust on all of us" Amelia commented with disappointment. There were some cries of agreement.

Rineke gave another deep sigh and closed his eyes as if they hurt.

"We couldn't afford rumors getting out. It would've put MNU on the lookout, don't you see? MNU would've found us eventually, and although we haven't done anything to break their laws, that wouldn't have stopped them from interrogating all of us! We could not risk it!"

Silence flooded the room once more and was only broken by Tau's puffs of impatience.

"So what are we going to do?" Moeketsi murmured a few seconds later.

"I've already mobilized all of PoHA through our web and Deviantart. All our members from around the world are supposed to be writing in their blogs about this, spreading the word. We'll summon a manifestation, get all the people we can to come and hope to make an impression. Some PoHA members from abroad told me they were coming as soon as they heard. Thomas is one of them."

"When are they starting this?" Glenda asked.

"Tomorrow."

"Already?"

Ana could hear murmurs and clicks of anguish. She looked up at Kyler. His frowning expression was not at all soothing.

"We'll have to make things quick" continued Rineke. "Whatever you have to do tomorrow, just miss it. Tell all the people you think might want to help, even outside PoHA, and we'll meet here tomorrow morning. We'll all head to the gates of District 9 together."

"That'll cause an impression" Tau growled sarcastically from his seat.

"Do you have any better ideas?"

"Yes!"

"Something that does not involve rioting or vandalism?"

"Is that all you have to propose?" Tau got up from his seat to confront his old mentor. "A demonstration? You think that will change their minds? A bunch of nerds with signs?"

"All I know is we can't provoke them any further, it will only make things worse! They're moving the poleepkwa precisely because people don't feel safe! More violence will only prove them right! Don't you dare give them a reason to arrest you, THAT would be worthless!"

"Let them arrest me! It'll be all over the news! That's what we need! We're not going anywhere by your methods, Rineke! You've all seen the usefulness of it! I will summon my own followers and unlike you I will make a difference! Who's with me?"

Tau became quiet waiting for someone to stand beside him, but no one made a move. He looked around him, his brow sweaty with despair.

"BJ" he called.

Black Jack did not remove his eyes from the carpet beneath his feet.

"Come on. Jasper, Amelia, Moeketsi, anybody!"

"Think this through, Tau" Rineke insisted. "Don't do anything stupid."

Tau only gave him an enraged look and ignored his plead.

He faced Kyler instead.

"You do agree, you do understand what this transfer means, right?"

Kyler shook his head slowly and said "_Sorry, Tau. I can't_."

"Ana."

Ana could barely stand to look in his clear eyes. She lowered hers to speak in the loudest voice she could manage.

"The other day, two police agents were going to arrest a poleepkwa for painting your graffitis. They would've taken her away if I hadn't distracted them."

Ana could hear Rineke give a deep sigh. A couple of steps from her, Crystal was respectfully keeping quiet. Kyler took Ana's hand and squeezed it.

"If that's how it's going to be… You won't get a reproach from my side, but I will have to do this alone, because I for one will not sit here watching how my people are taken away to their oblivion!"

"You're not a Poleepkwa, Tau."

"As far as I'm concerned, I am!" Tau yelled and after dedicating everybody an offended look he stormed out of the house with determination. Ana thought it was over, but then Jack started towards the front door himself with a firm step.

"Jack, don't" Rineke said. It was not an order.

Jack halted.

" _He's right_ " he said. " _The demonstration won't work_. "

"Of course it…"

" _No, it won't_! " Jack interrupted, raising his voice. " _It won't work. The worst thing is you all know this. You just don't care_. "

"That's not true" Amelia said.

Black Jack didn't listen.

"_ You will go to that demonstration convinced of your good intentions and when it's all over and all this turns out to be completely worthless because we have all been taken two hundred kilometers from here, you'll just pat each other on the back saying 'we did all that we could'…_ " Amelia was fiercely shaking her head as Jack spoke _" …and then go about your comfortable lives, proud of yourselves, happy for having been of some small help. You act like you care, but you wouldn't take risks for any of us!_ "

"We don't risk?" Jen repeated and Sam placed his hand on her shoulder so as to calm her down. "How d- that does NOT make any SENSE! What do you mean we don't risk? We DO risk! A lot!"

"Tomorrow we will be risking our lives too" Amelia added.

"_You, unlike me, have rights. You are not risking your lives by going to a demonstration._"

"Maybe not literally, but we risk all that we have to defend you" Amelia went on with incredible ease. "Our friends, our family, our careers… all just to be of some help."

"_Well_" Jack said "_your help is obviously worth squat_" Black Jack spat and stomped away and through the door, slamming it shut behind him.


	9. Chapter 9

I've been recieving more generous reviews on this^^ Since I can't answer them all on this site, apparently, I thank you from here! Enjoy this chapter. Tragedy ensues, so be warned. I figured the feel of the movie had to influence on this fic sometime, and that time is now.

Note: I normally use the arrowy symbols for signalling prawntalk, but somehow erases them for some weird reason, so prawntalk just seems like normal english here. Just wanted to point that out, they're still speaking prawn, OK?

* * *

**Chapter 9 - No place like home**

The district's guard towers loomed over the dozens of protesters casting their shadows on the many signs that danced above the crowd showing words like "LEAVE THEM ALONE" and "NON-HUMAN RIGHTS". It was more than Ana had expected at first, which made her hopeful. TV cameras all around took images of people chanting in unison as the MNU employed guards kept watch armed exaggeratedly for the occasion. Overall there must have been over two hundred humans and a whole bunch of Poleepkwa gathered before the District's concrete walls. There were people there Ana had never seen, and many were from abroad.  
The entire gang was there, of course. Jen met up around noon with Sam, and little Saskia, who was sporting a brand new striped shirt that looked five sizes bigger than him, immediately climbed up his human mother's skirt and nuzzled at her cheek with his undeveloped mandibles; Jasper showed up the earliest and started displaying his own sign with vigor alongside Amelia, Josh, Moeketsi and Fanny; Rineke was requesting some common sense out of a group of enthusiastic young men who seemed to think the event called for a little revolutionary vandalism such as burning trash containers; Crystal was timidly participating on the sides with another sign and Kyler had just that moment appeared and poked Ana's shoulder with his hard, pointed finger.  
" Hi, Ana. "  
She turned around in a grace-lacking swirl.  
"Hi" she replied and threw herself at his neck, expecting him to pick her up and squeeze her, which he didn't. So Ana just bounced awkwardly back on her feet and felt Kyler's arms embrace her gingerly, almost like he feared she'd break. "What's up?" she asked, though there was no question as to what was making Kyler sad. She had just been hoping it wouldn't show on him as well.  
" Nothing " he purred quietly and then looked around at their chaotic surroundings. " You didn't bring your friend? "  
Ana winced.  
She really did try to tell Syrup. Actually she even got so far as to ask her whether she was doing anything today, but since she already had plans, Ana did not insist and instead enjoyed a momentary feeling of relief, to be later replaced by shameful guilt. Maybe she thought in a way that if she ever gave up her secret, it would all go away. These were her people now, her friends. She didn't want to risk having to renounce to them.  
"Oh, she couldn't come… What?" Ana asked, aware that Kyler was hardly paying attention. At least not to her face.  
"It's your shoulder. It's fascinating" he replied eagerly.  
"Is it?" Ana giggled, rubbing her shoulder. Despite the still cool August weather, it was warm in the sunlight and she was wearing a tank top.  
Kyler would often grab her hand and remain looking at it for minutes at a time, playing with her fingers, stroking the knuckles and gingerly pinching the soft flesh at the base of the thumb.  
"What's so fascinating about a shoulder?"  
" You can make out the humeral head. And the clavicle, and the scapula. And the muscles under that " Kyler pointed out, gently moving Ana's arm up and down like a rag doll's to look at the effect. " It's so strange. "  
"Have you been memorizing the human anatomy book I lent you?"  
Kyler only kept staring at her shoulder and his eyes smiled.  
" I'm going to miss humans " he added sadly and let go of Ana's arm.  
A short silence made all the other people's voices seem so much louder.  
"Maybe you won't have to go" Ana said.  
But Kyler's eyes had wondered off again towards a point behind Ana.  
" Oh, no " he growled.  
"What, what?" Ana demanded, looking behind her.  
" That's Hild. I call him 'Happy Trigger' he explained, anxiously clicking his mandibles together.  
"What's that word, trigger ?" she asked, pronouncing the Poleepkwan word as well as she could.  
" He's not someone nice to be around of. Especially if you're a prawn. "  
"What's he doing?"  
" Inspecting. I'd better get away. I'll be back as soon as he's gone. "  
"Oh, uh… OK."  
Kyler scurried away and was soon lost amidst the crowd. Then the tip of a gun appeared on the other side of Ana and the guard called Hild followed it.  
"Let me see that purse" he commanded and Ana did not hesitate for an instant. Hild rummaged briefly around inside her purse. "Ok, you're good to go."  
And he was gone as fast as he had come. She exhaled loudly, seeing him go, and then she got on the tips of her toes to try to look over the heads of the protesters, which turned out pretty worthless. A few pairs of antennae stuck out from the crowd, but she couldn't tell which belonged to someone she knew. All she did know was that she needed some air, so she made her way through the mud-thick multitude until she found herself next to Rineke.  
He seemed lost in thought, and somewhat restless. He kept staring at no place in particular, like he was waiting for something.  
"What do you think will happen?" she asked, hoping he would be able to give her a brighter opinion on the Poleepkwa's future.  
"Nothing SHOULD happen. I'm just worried for Tau" he replied, obviously misunderstanding the question.  
She decided not to correct him.  
"And Jack?"  
Rineke shook his head absent-mindedly, his gaze still lost within the boundaries of the district. "Haven't heard from him either."  
" Rineke. "  
Another Poleepkwa Ana didn't know stepped up to them, curiously peeking at Ana through the corner of his eye. He was unusually tall and wore a long hoody that must have been hand-made given its proportions.  
Rineke came out of his trance.  
"What did you find out?"  
" The Nigerians won't cooperate, but I do have reason to believe Tau has been seeing them. "  
Suddenly Rineke looked like he was going to be sick.  
"Maybe we should get everybody out of-"  
BOOM!  
The concrete wall blasted open with a cloud of thick, black smoke and a sound like thunder. Dust particles and pebbles everywhere were raining down on the crowd, which had already started to break in an attempt to run away from the scene. Rineke grabbed Ana and pulled her down to the ground.  
"You go!" he told the poleepkwa and the alien made a run for it. People all around were dropping their signs and pushing each other in order to get out, but a few gunshots made everybody duck and then turn around.  
The MNU guards who had been roaming around were now up and alert, their rifles at the ready, driving the protesters against the District's walls. More guards were coming from nowhere to join their mates and soon they were surrounded.  
"Everybody on the ground now!" one of them yelled through the protection of his helmet. Some people obeyed at once. Many were too frightened to even hear. A few were still trying to find a way around the guards blinded by hysteria.  
Then a terrible sight caught hold of Ana; that of Tau running towards them through the curtain of smoke that emanated from the gap in the wall. He was being followed closely by armed men. A deafening bang pierced Ana's right ear and she cringed, looking up just in time to see how Tau toppled over to the ground, rising a cloud of dust, and was motionless.  
Ana could barely hear the screams. Rineke dashed forward and kneeled over the still body of Tau, attempting to reanimate him. Warily she stood up, unable to take her eyes off the body. Her ear was giving off an awful whistle. Slowly it faded away, and the sounds of agitation and panic returned. Turning on her heels she saw people running around and the guard who had fired the shot.  
Hild was yelling at Rineke to get away from Tau. Ana only had time to see him step up to Rineke with his rifle raised and aimed at him before a poleepkwa figure came racing through the wall shooting an alien-looking weapon wildly.  
" MURDERERS! " roared Black Jack, and a soldier literally exploded with the gun's fire.  
"Jack, don't!" Rineke yelled.  
Suddenly every other guard was shooting at Jack, and that's as much as Ana could see before an avalanche of people came stumbling towards her, driven by the guards like sheep towards the inside of the District. She was knocked about by crazed hands and her nose received a blow from a stranger's elbow, making her eyes tear up and blind her vision. Then someone grabbed her hand and pulled fiercely of it.  
Suddenly she found herself face to face with Kyler. She almost jumped to cling at his chest and not let go, but the people kept coming. They had to get out.  
There was another gunshot close to them and they both flinched. Kyler gave a tight squeeze to Ana's hand, then he pulled of her and they started moving, Kyler leading the way, taking advantage of the chaos and confusion. She couldn't see any of the others and her stomach dropped with the weight of dark thoughts. The image of Tau falling crept into her mind, and then Tau's figure was replaced by each one of her PoHA friends.  
They trotted together through smoke and dust, avoiding the guard's rifles. It wasn't long until Ana realized she was being led into of District 9.  
Soon the sound of yelling and screaming began to fade and looking around her Ana saw poleepkwa heads peering out of the doors of the dozens and dozens of filthy shacks, following them with their gaze.  
"Kyler…!" she whined breathlessly, but Kyler would not reply. "Where are we going?"  
Suddenly Kyler turned a corner and hurriedly guided Ana behind a big metal container half hidden in shadows and pulled her down towards the ground so she would sit. He hunkered down in front of her with his arms spread as though shielding her and then went to poke out his head to look towards the gates, breathing heavily. He crept back towards her on his four limbs and Ana saw the reason why he wouldn't speak to her.  
Kyler's breathing was heavy and gurgled and he began coughing violently, his hand over his throat covering what was apparently a bleeding bullet wound.  
"Kyler!" Ana exclaimed, and Kyler's other hand covered her mouth at once. His bloody hand took a bloody finger to his mouth parts to plead for silence in a very human gesture before returning to his throat. Ana tried to get his hand off her mouth to get a closer look, but he just kept pushing her away. Then he sat down beside her, still choking on his own blood, and Ana sat up to look at him, fear and despair boiling inside her.  
"Kyler, what… how…?" she moaned, her voice barely a whisper, and he just showed her the palm of his hand.  
" It's not… " he coughed " that bad. "  
"You've been shot! In the throat!" she cried.  
Kyler took a few seconds to get some air, all the while making soothing gestures at Ana.  
" Really, it's not like in humans… " he paused and coughed a little more. " It's not serious. Only messy. "  
"Are you sure?" Ana said, still unwilling to believe that.  
" Yes. It's just all this… " he coughed again and a thin threat of red stuff dripped from his tendrils " …blood. We have to get to a safe place. My shack is nearby, if we can…"  
He raised his head to look around for a moment, then he took Ana's hand again and made them both stand up.  
" This way. "  
He led her through the district turning right and left among the dusty shacks which were surrounded by litter and waste and soon they arrived at a small hut built with wooden panels bolted to slabs of sheet metal and just anything an average human dwelling would not be made of. It stood out for its outer simplicity, yet as soon as Kyler let Ana inside, her mouth fell open.  
There was not one mildly luxurious object in the small cramped room, but it was instead decorated with a hundred different little treasures, many crafted into fantastic pieces that hung from the ceiling or the walls, like an artist's workshop. An entire table was covered in pieces of broken machinery ready to be made into new works of art.  
Some clanking of metal made her turn around. Kyler was running a few locks on the recycled wooden door. Then he stepped over to the window and stood watch for a few moments. Meanwhile Ana had found another object of interest.  
It was a sketchbook. Not even a sketchbook, it was just a regular notebook filled with drawings. Ana opened it at random and stared at the image of a young human lady, drawn messily and with very little technique but still charming and expressive and full of detail. Her hair was long and straight, and her nose was long and slightly pointed. Ana turned the pages. There were drawings of other poleepkwa and other humans drawn in thick black lines; there were also some anatomical drawings in the very last pages, and some animals and writing, but that lady was everywhere.  
"Is this me?" she said.  
Kyler turned away from the window and saw what she was looking at.  
" Oh… " he clicked timidly. " Yes. "  
Ana gave one silent chuckle.  
"These are very pretty" she muttered, passing the pages slowly. "How come you never showed me?"  
Kyler walked up to the table to stand beside her.  
" I never take it with me. I'm afraid I'll lose it, or it'll get stolen. "  
"I didn't know you liked to draw. Or… any of this" she made one wide movement of her hand, pointing at all the hanging toys. "You made this one with pieces of the clock!"  
" There were still some spare pieces and I didn't want to throw them away. "  
Ana watched the old clock's bells swing before returning to the sketchbook.  
"I love it."  
" I'm not very good. "  
"No, they're great! Lots better than anything I can do. Really."  
" Thank you. I'm a little new at this. Amelia gave me this notebook… " he looked up at the ceiling, thinking. " …a little after I joined PoHA. "  
"You've gotten very good! If you could take a few lessons you'd be set for the Fine Arts" she chuckled, but was not kidding.  
" I can't though… "  
Ana's face drooped.  
"Yeah… Maybe someday."  
" Maybe. "  
"Or maybe we can get someone to teach you."  
Kyler smiled in his poleepkwa way, probably imagining what it would be like. Ana wanted to believe this would all end well, but it was turning out to be a very difficult thing to believe at the moment. Tau… The image of him falling lifeless to the ground made it so much harder to fully enjoy what she was seeing. And Kyler seemed to be thinking the same.  
That reminded her…  
"Lemme see" she said, pointing at Kyler's throat. Unlike Black Jack, Kyler gladly bent over so he was at eye level with Ana,. "Well, I don't know much about… poleepkwa anatomy… Looks like it went in and out."  
" It's nothing. Really. The bleeding's stopped and everything. How about you? "  
"What about me?"  
Kyler pointed at Ana's nose and she took her hand to it, realizing for the first time that it had recently been dripping blood and now was almost dry.  
"Ooh, bleedy nose…" she mumbled, attempting to clean it with her shirt, which didn't make it that much better since it was covered in dirt.  
Just then a knocking on the door made them both freeze in terror. Kyler stepped in front of her and gently pushed her away from the door.  
"Do you have a back door?" Ana breathed hopefully.  
But the back door wasn't necessary. Before they had time to hide, Jasper's voice called Kyler's name from outside the door. Kyler hurried over to the door and opened up to Jasper, Amelia, Sam, Jen and Saskia, who all looked pretty shaken, but happy to see them.  
"We hoped you'd be here" Amelia wheezed and threw herself at Kyler, who gratefully returned the hug. Then she hugged Ana. "Tau…!" she moaned.  
"I know…"  
"Ohh, I can't believe all this has happened…"  
Kyler made everybody enter the small room and locked the door again.  
"Where are the others?" Ana asked.  
" We don't know, but we think Josh, Thomas and Fanny made it out. No news on the rest " Jasper explained.  
"Crystal?"  
" Don't know. "  
"Black Jack?"  
" Don't know. "  
"And Rineke?"  
"He's… been arrested. I think" Amelia said.  
" He was " Sam confirmed. " I saw them taking him away in a van. "  
"But they can't do anything to him. Right?" Jen asked alarmingly.  
"Of course not. He'll be ok" Amelia said, putting an arm over Jen's shoulders, not just to cheer Jen up, Ana thought, but to cheer herself up as well.  
" Don't worry. As soon as things calm down in here we can get you out " Sam said, stroking Jen's shoulder encouragingly.  
" As long as we have to stay in here, we might as well get comfortable. Ky, don't mind if I make myself at home " Jasper said.  
Kyler smiled and they all sat wherever they could, whether it was on Kyler's sofa or on the floor with some blankets. A short while passed in complete silence before Amelia suggested calling someone. No one could believe none of them had thought of that.  
"I get no coverage here" Amelia said, moving the phone around.  
"Me neither" Jen mumbled.  
"Wait, let me check" offered Ana and she got up to walk around the room.  
That's when she saw the group of three MNU officials outside coming out of a couple of vans and moving slowly towards them. Two of them were armed.  
"Oh shit!" she hissed.  
Everybody got up as a response and they all went to the window.  
"What are they here for?"  
"Is it the eviction thing?"  
" They can't see you in here! " Sam clicked. " They're going to stop at our door, you better all hide and we can talk to them. "  
"Wait, no! What if it's not about the evictions?" Jen said, holding on to Sam's arm so as to keep him from going outside. "Shouldn't we all hide and let them knock?"  
" If no one answers the door they'll just break in " Jasper said. " We have to answer. "  
The intruders were already knocking on the door.  
" I guess I should go since the shack is mine " Kyler said and made to open it. Ana grabbed his arm in a quick reflex.  
"Kyler…!"  
He patted her hand softly and then gently swept it off his arm.  
"Be careful."  
Kyler nodded. The knocking insisted impatiently.  
"MNU, open up, please!"  
" Everybody to the back of the shack " he said and waited until everybody was out of immediate sight. Half concealed in shadows and blankets, Ana and the rest watched as Kyler opened the door to a bureaucratic-looking MNU employee.  
"Are you Kyler Asher?"  
Kyler went outside closing the door behind him and replied at once.  
" Yeah. "  
"We have an arrest order for Samuel Anderson, and we thought you could tell us his whereabouts."  
"Oh, no...!" Jen whispered at Ana's side.  
Kyler hesitated for a second.  
" Why did you think that? "  
"Sir, I suggest you cooperate before we arrest you too" the smug MNU employee said.  
" I don't know any Samuel Anderson. "  
"We have in fact reason to believe you do."  
" What reason? "  
"You're not the one asking the questions. Can you tell us where he is or not?" the man insisted, his voice becoming dangerous.  
" He must be at home, I don't know. "  
"Are you hiding him in your shack, sir?"  
This time Kyler had no words.  
"May we take a look?" the man asked politely, though Ana had the feeling he would not wait for permission.  
"No!" Jen exclaimed in seeing Sam get up and hurry over to the door. The rest of them had to hold on to her to keep her from going after him.  
Sam went through the door just in time to prevent the men from coming inside. He went outside and closed the door. The words were perfectly audible from inside the shack. Jen was sobbing uncontrollably now.  
"Samuel Anderson?"  
" Yes. "  
"You're under arrest for violation of the article 7.1.4 regarding un-hygienic relationships with humans."  
There was some clicking of cuffs and a sound of opening and closing doors, all half drowned by Jen's whimpers, which were becoming louder by the second. She held Saskia tighter against her, and the little one looked terrified and confused by his human mother's reactions.  
"Jen, shh! Sshhh!" Amelia whispered, though her eyes were almost as shiny as Jen's.  
But Jen couldn't take it any longer.  
"Take him!" she plead to Amelia, holding Saskia out to her.  
"What?"  
"Take him! Watch him for me!"  
"Jen, what are you- No! Jen!"  
Before any of them could grab hold of her, Jen had jumped to her feet, Saskia reaching out for her from Amelia's lap with his little arms, and stormed out of the shack.  
" Jen! " came Kyler's voice.  
"Hello! What's this?" the MNU employee said.  
Jen ran directly towards the van and pounded at the back doors.  
"SAM! Let him go!"  
"So you're the little slut who's been fucking that prawn, eh? Take him away!" he said and one of the vans started. The two armed men grabbed Jen's arms and pulled her away from it.  
"No! NO! SAM!"  
"Carl, get the cuffs, she's just as guilty. A shame, pretty women unavailable for us because they're off dating prawns."  
The van was getting away, leaving a trail of dust that already made it so much harder to see.  
"NO, SAAAM!" Jen screeched.  
"So how many more you hiding in there, prawn?" cried one of the armed men peering inside the shack. "Everybody out, now."  
"Shit, look at this? What were you doing in there, an orgy?"  
The rest of the men laughed hysterically in seeing the rest of them come out of the shack.  
"I don't think we have enough cuffs for all of them!" chuckled one of the armed soldiers. "How about you, honey, you fucking this prawn too?" he said to Ana from behind while putting the last pair of cuffs on her wrists. Ana cringed in feeling the man's breath on her neck, tears trickling down her cheeks.  
Ana's eyes searched Kyler's, and they as bereft of hope as she was. She thought of the things that could happen to him from now on and rage boiled inside of her, burning her throat, knowing there was nothing she could do about it.  
"Come on, in the van" the bureaucratic-looking man said, leading Amelia towards the back side of the van. She stopped right before the doors and turned her head to look at them all with a blank expression. Jen was weeping loudly being held by another soldier.  
The man, impatient with Amelia's passive stance, pushed her towards the inside of the van.  
That's when Amelia responded by turning around and giving the man the hardest beating Ana had ever seen a girl impart on anyone. She delivered blow after blow swiftly and severely with all the rage of her being, making the man bend and coil up on the ground with one cry for each furious kick.  
"Get away from him!" yelled the others.  
"Lady, we're warning you!"  
Amelia did not listen.  
Then there was a gunshot that made everybody exclaim their anguish and Amelia fell over with a cry of pain.  
Jasper gave a roar of fury and attacked, taking a rifle from one of the men and firing. The two armed men soon fell motionless, leaving Jen free to run away in the direction that the van had gone.  
"Jen!" screamed Ana.  
"…men down, requesting back-up!"  
Once the noise died down, along with the soldiers, the bureaucratic-looking MNU employee's voice could be heard speaking to his walkie-talkie. By the time Kyler took it from him, the next group of armed men was already turning the corner. Kyler threw the device to the ground and ran, taking Ana's hand to make her follow him and picking up Saskia in the way. They all hid behind the shack while Jasper ducked behind the van to keep fighting. Amelia was sitting next to him grabbing her shoulder but pretty much awake while bullets flew everywhere.  
Just then a shadow flew by down one of the streets and Ana turned her head to see Black Jack, who had at that very instant halted with the alien weapon in his hands aware that there was someone there.  
"Jack, help!" she screamed, and Jack only looked at them for a couple of seconds before he continued running and disappeared behind a row of shacks. Ana wondered whether he had recognized them until she realized sadly that there was no way he could not have.  
The shooting kept going and she could hardly know what was going on except that Jasper and Amelia were still behind the van and that the van was being turned into a giant kitchen strainer. But what was more worrying was the liquid dripping under the van.  
"Jasper!" she screamed in an impulse "get away from the van! The gas is leaking, get away…!"  
Jasper was helping Amelia walk away when it happened. There was an earsplitting boom. A ball of fire enveloped the van and sent Jasper and Amelia flying a few feet. Jasper had been trying to shield Amelia and fell on top of her.  
The silence that came afterwards was unnerving.  
Ana saw Jasper shifting slowly to get off of Amelia and shaking her shoulder to wake her up. Amelia wasn't moving. It got worse when the footsteps of the soldiers approached them, followed by the soldiers themselves. They surrounded Jasper and Amelia and aimed with their rifles.  
"Get away from her, prawn!"  
But Jasper would not get away from Amelia. He crouched over her, protecting her from the soldiers, giving his back to them.  
"I said get away from her, now!"  
Ana and Kyler stared in horror as the soldier pointed his weapon at the back of Jasper's head.  
"Get up now, prawn, or I'll blow your fucking brains out!"  
Jasper's eyes were shut tight as he started to back up from Amelia on his four limbs.  
There was a strange electrical blast and Ana thought the soldier had done it, but when she opened her eyes again, suddenly the soldier had been replaced by a shower of what looked like molten meat. The soldiers screamed and fired their guns at whatever was making this happen, but Ana saw them go one by one and in the end there were only a bunch of red splatters all over the floor. Black Jack then became visible from Ana's and Kyler's perspective as he approached the group carrying the alien weapon.  
They got up immediately and ran towards them, Kyler holding Saskia in his arms. Ana kneeled over Amelia and checked that she was still breathing. She sighed with relief. Amelia only seemed unconscious.  
But she sat up and saw Jasper grasping the tip of a metallic object that protruded from the center of his chest and her heart stopped.  
He was trying to pull it out, all the while looking around to all of them, strangely energetic and awake, as if it were nothing more than an annoying little splinter.  
Jen wailed in the distance, already given up trying to follow the van that had taken Sam away.


End file.
